Precious Metals
by tenspeed457
Summary: AU Bronzeshipping fic- when Malik finds himself without a place to live, he ends up staying with Marik... yaoi. sorry for the lame description.
1. Chapter 1

(I don't own anything)

* * *

~Chapter One~

* * *

"Bronze is considerably less brittle than iron. Typically, bronze only oxidizes superficially; once a copper oxide- which eventually becomes copper carbonate- layer is formed, the underlying metal is protected from further corrosion. Bronze resists corrosion, especially seawater corrosion, and 'metal fatigue' more than steel and is also a better conductor of heat and electricity than most steels. It is a very important material, and is used in a wide variety of fields, from boat and submarine propellers, to springs and car parts, to beautiful works of art."

Alright, then. I'd been sitting there for at least 20 minutes, and I was already dying of boredom... how would I survive a whole freaking semester of this crap? I don't I _care _about the properties of bronze. If there are gods, then please, please--BANG! What the hell was that?!! Oh, just the door being slammed open... there was a guy standing in the doorway, looking totally pissed off. He dragged his feet and his backpack to the back of the room, the professor resuming the lecture after glaring at the newcomer. He glanced at me, and I realized that I had been staring unabashedly, my mouth open slightly. I blushed and went back to my doodling, my heart racing. His eyes... I hadn't ever seen anyone other than myself with eyes that color. His hair, too, and his skin tone... he seemed to match me. I glanced across the room, and I saw Ryou looking at me; he, too, had noticed that the guy looked like me. This was very strange; never in my life had I ever heard of anyone else with purple eyes. As far as I could tell, they just weren't normal. People weren't supposed to look like me. My sister looked like your average Egyptian woman: long, smooth, dark hair, tanned skin, and dark, beautiful eyes. Both of my parents, too, had looked like typical Egyptians. None of us could figure out where my eyes and hair had come from. Okay, Malik, I told myself. Pay attention. Failing this class was not an option if I wanted to get out of this hell.

I caught up with Ryou after class.

"Malik, did you see that?" he asked quietly. "That guy looks just like you!"

I nodded. "I know... I wonder where he's from?"

"Egypt," a deeper voice said behind us, making us jump. Oh, gods- it was him, and he'd heard us talking about him. "You could have just asked, you know. It's really rude to talk about people behind their backs."

Ryou looked like he might pass out. "S-Sorry," he stammered, but the other guy just laughed.

"Dude, chill. I'm just fucking with you. I don't really give a shit about who talks about me." He started to walk away, and I could feel myself start to panic.

"Wait!" I called. He turned around to look at me, his expression bored.

"What is it?" Yeah, Malik. What do you want? Think fast! Gods, I didn't even know what I wanted to say to him!

"Um..."

"C'mon, spit it out..."

"W-What's your name?" I sounded totally lame.

"Marik."

"Seriously?" He looked irritated.

"No, I'm lying. Yes, seriously."

"I-I just am surprised. My name is Malik..."

"Cool story. You should tell that one at parties."

"No!" I burst out. "Don't you see how similar it sounds? And why are your eyes purple? And your hair the same color as mine, and you said you were from Egypt! Egyptians aren't supposed to look like we do, and the rest of my family looks normal, and-"

"Shut up! Holy fucking Ra! Give me a chance to answer! Yeah, weird thing with the names, but I can't help you on the rest of it. I don't know why I look like this at all. Now I don't want to spend any more time here than I absolutely have to, so let's get the fuck out of here." Oh. I hadn't even realized that we were still standing in the classroom.

"Sorry." His expression was a cross between irritation and amusement. Ryou had already slipped away; that jerk had left me to deal with this slightly scary guy on my own. Thanks, Ryou. I followed him out of the room.

"Gods! Knock it off already!"

"Knock what off?"

"You keep giving me weird looks. What do you want, anyway? I got better things to do right now." Stupid me, shouldn't have opened my mouth...

"I just- I wondered what part of Egypt you were from... My family is from northern Egypt, but I don't look like anyone there, so... I just wondered..." He was watching me stutter with amusement.

"Listen, kid. I dunno what to tell you that you haven't already heard. I'm from Cairo, but I don't look like anyone there, either. Caused me some trouble when I was younger, but now that I'm as sexy as I am, the eyes are just the icing on the cake. They're great at attracting the ladies, you know?" He nudged me, winking. "And the guys." Oh, gods! My face was burning! I attempted to stammer something, but just managed to make myself sound like more of an idiot than I already did. "Dude, chill. Don't get all freaked out about it. It's not that big of a deal. Anyway, I'll see you later. Take it easy, man."

"Wait!"

"Now what?" He turned, rolling his eyes.

"S-Sorry for bothering you!!" I managed to spit out, before practically running away. Smooth, Malik. Really smooth... I wasn't sure what had gotten into me. Yeah, I was a shy person, but I wasn't usually this painfully awkward around people. I sighed as I flopped down on the bench, waiting for the bus. I wasn't really looking forward to being home. Isis probably wouldn't be there, and although her boyfriend, Patrick, was always nice enough to me I could always tell that he didn't really like having me around. Of course, it probably didn't help that I hadn't been able to help pay any of the bills or anything. But I was having a hard enough time paying for my college with my pathetic job. The only good thing about it was that I sometimes got to bring home pizzas from work.

Well, there was nothing else for me to do but go home. I didn't work tonight, which was actually kind of unfortunate. Usually, my nights off were filled with homework, but as it was the first day of the semester, there had been nothing assigned. I found the house empty, a note from Patrick saying that he would be back later. Well, that was okay. Maybe I could do something useful for once. I began cleaning, first in the kitchen and then moving my way through the other rooms. The house wasn't very big, but it was enough work to keep me busy while I listened to my iPod. I had it turned up so high, I almost didn't hear Patrick come in.

"Hey, Malik. What's up?"

"Nothing much... how'd work go?"

He rolled his eyes. "Ugh. We're not even going to talk about it."

"Ooh... sorry."

"Hey, there was something I wanted to talk to you about..." He looked a little uncomfortable.

"Yeah?"

"Well... I was thinking, and, um... well, I wanted to sorta kinda ask your-your sister to marry me." I wasn't sure what to say. Sure, I'd been expecting it for a while now, but why he was consulting me was beyond me.

"U-um, that's great, Patrick. But uh, don't you think you should be talking to her about it?"

"Well, yeah... but I had kind of wanted to make sure it was okay with you, and... um... look, Malik. Your sister and I want to start a family, but we don't really have enough room or money at the moment..." Okay, so that's where this was going.

"So you want me out of here?"

"No! I mean, that's not exactly it." He seemed really uncomfortable. Good.

"Please don't sugarcoat it, Patrick. It's okay, I understand."

"You do?" he asked hopefully, his expression brightening.

I nodded. "I... I mean, this was always a temporary situation. I wasn't going to be staying here forever. I mean, it's fair that you want to have your own house to yourself. You deserve to have privacy."

He looked so relieved. "Malik, I don't want you to think that we're kicking you out, or anything like that."

Hey, man. It's cool. I'll just go live with my relatives. Oh wait- they were all dead. Too bad.

"No, no. It's okay," I repeated. "I'm pretty sure Yugi and Ryou won't mind me staying with them for a few weeks. Don't worry about it." I turned away from him before I said something that I might regret.

"Are you hungry?" he asked me, trying to break the awkward silence that had fallen upon us.

"No," I lied. "I got something with Ryou earlier." I wasn't really in the mood for eating after being told by my sister's obnoxious boyfriend that he would be stealing the only living family I have away from me and kicking me out of my own house to fend for myself. Okay, so maybe that was a little too harsh. I was happy for them, really. Patrick did love Isis, and he made her really happy. The gods know that she deserved it, after raising me from childhood and sacrificing so much for me.

"When are you going to ask her?" I asked, feigning cheerfulness.

"Um.. I was hoping to do it tonight," he confessed, rummaging in his briefcase for a moment. "You want to see the ring?"

"Sure." He opened the little box, and I couldn't repress a gasp. It was absolutely beautiful; a plain gold band sporting the design of the Eye of Horus, an inlaid diamond forming the pupil of the eye. On either side of the eye design were chips of lapis lazuli, and around the band were tiny hieroglyphics that read something along the lines of "On the Eastern bank, our love flourishes; on the Western bank, it continues." Rough translation, but close enough.

"Do you think she'll like it?" Seriously? He really had to ask me?

"She'll love it," I assured him, knowing that he was a good choice for her.

He smiled. "I hope so. Hey, thanks for cleaning up! You should go relax; I'm going to start dinner."

Oh, thank you. Once again, I had been dismissed. Whatever. It was probably for the best. I didn't really want to be around so much joy and excitement when I felt so down. If I stuck around, I would just kill the happy mood, so I retreated to my room. Better that only one of us was miserable than all three.

* * *

A/N: Okay, so here's my promised bronzeshipping fic. I love this pairing, and there isn't nearly enough of it for me. I'm not going to do as much with side pairings in this fic as in my others, but... oh well.

as for the info on bronze, wikipedia gets all the credit for it.

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

~Little Ryuu, thank you for being so enthusiastic about the idea of this. ^.^

hmm, what else... OH! as for Patrick, I based him entirely off of Patrick from The Amory Wars, which is the graphic novel series that accompanies Coheed and Cambria's music (written by their lead singer, Claudio Sanchez). He's Josephine's fiance in it, and he meets a sort of gruesome end (of course, so does almost everyone, but that's totally not the point here). I am.... a little obsessed with that band, and if you don't like them, then... well, you should. :P but yeah. sorry to those of you who read many of my other works; I throw references here and there in all of my stories, and one of my other YGO ones (Save Us from Sleep, and What We Are) is a Coheed and Cambria songfic. so yeah, if you do read them, then you've already heard this little spiel (I had a hell of a time spelling that word just now), so I apologize.

but anyway, sorry for that sidenote, but thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed it, and I would really appreciate any feedback; let me know what you think! I try to respond to reviews, so it's helpful if you sign in.... I feel bad when I can't thank people properly. but whatever. I'm in a great mood. :D probably b/c I'm wearing my prideshipping t-shirt... it's got Yami and Seto on the front, and on the back, it says "Prideshipping... YxS." I made it on some t-shirt website. had to go through three to find one that didn't freak out about copyright... :/

thank you again!!!

~alex~


	2. Chapter 2

~Chapter Two~

* * *

"Hey, Malik! How are you today?" Ugh. As much as I love Yugi, he's too damn cheerful in the morning.

"Hey, guys. I'm... okay. You?"

"We're fine," Yugi answered immediately, speaking for Ryou as well, "But what's wrong with you? You don't look so great..." Thanks, Yugi. I sighed. I should have just tried to act normal.

"Patrick proposed to Isis last night."

"But why is that bad?" Ryou asked, confused.

"It's not. I'm happy for them, really, but I'm going to need to find somewhere else to stay. You know; they want to start a family, but I'm kind of complicating things."

"Well, you can stay with us for a few weeks," Yugi told me. "My cousin is coming in a little bit, but you can stay until then." Of course I would pick now to get kicked out, right when Yami would be coming to stay.

"Thanks, Yugi." He and Ryou smiled at me, and for their sakes, I had to pretend that I shared their enthusiasm.

* * *

I moved in with them a couple of days later.

"Malik, remember that you're welcome to call if you need anything," Isis reminded me for the thousandth time, although Patrick's expression indicated that he didn't really agree.

"I know, Isis. Thank you. I'll keep in touch. It's not like I'm dropping off the face of the earth or anything." She sniffed, wiping her eyes.

"I know. I think it's good that you're going to be on your own." She smiled, and I could see just how happy she was.

"Thanks. I love you."

"I love you too, Malik." Yugi and Ryou helped me move my few possessions into their apartment, even though I could have fit them all in one duffle bag. I didn't exactly spend much time at home, after all, between work and school. Basically, things didn't change too much.

One day after class, I was walking slowly down the hall, my mind somewhere else.

"Hey, kid." Why did he always have to call me kid? He couldn't be that much older than me. "You got the stuff we did on Tuesday? I wasn't here." Well, I knew there was a good reason to take such detailed notes! I handed them to Marik.

"Here you go."

"Thanks, man," he said gratefully. "I'll get them back to you on Tuesday, alright?" I nodded. The class we had together was on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

"Yeah... so I'll, um... see you later, then?"

"Yeah, later man." he wandered away.

"Hey, what are you so happy about?" Ryou teased, shoving me lightly.

"What?"

"You look very pleased with yourself." I hadn't even realized that I'd been smiling.

"I dunno. I'm allowed to smile if I want, aren't I?"

"Of course. I was just wondering what Marik said to make you look so happy." She smiled sweetly at me. That's the thing with Ryou. He seemed really nice and innocent, but he is actually a very twisted human being who loves making people feel uncomfortable. Well, he's not that bad, but you know.

"I just let him borrow my notes!"

"Oh, so that's what they're calling it these days?" My mouth had fallen open in shock.

"W-What the hell is that supposed to mean?!?" I could feel my face blushing. He just smirked at me.

"I dunno, what do you think?" I rolled my eyes at him.

"Shut the fuck up, Ryou." He giggled as I shoved him, probably a little harder than was strictly necessary. I sighed as I looked at the time on my phone. "Hey, I gotta get to work, but I'll see you guys when I get home, okay?" He nodded.

"Have fun!" He said, being painfully sarcastic, and gave me a thumbs up. I rolled my eyes again.

"Ugh. Just shoot me," I muttered, making the shape of a gun with my hand and "shooting" myself.

"Sorry. They'd trace the gun back to me. Find someone else to kill you."

"You know what?" I pointed a finger menacingly at Ryou. "You had better watch it." His eyes widened.

"I'm so frightened!" He feigned fear.

"Gah!" I threw my hands up in exasperation. "Enough! Enough, already! Good bye." He laughed, victorious. He would always see how far he could push me. Sometimes I wanted to push him- right off of a bridge. But yeah. Things didn't go any better than I'd expected. I dunno, I hate my job. I work at a pizza place. You'd expect it to be tolerable, wouldn't you? You know, everyone loves pizza, so they should be in a good mood. Apparently not.

"Hey, Malik!"

"Hey, Yugi." I didn't really feel like talking at the moment.

"How was work?" He just had to ask...

"Shit." He fell silent, finally picking up on my mood. I still had a ton of homework, and tomorrow was my early class. Sighing, I sank down into a chair. I was trying to get started, and then my phone rang. Seeing that it was Isis, I answered.

"Hey, Sis! How's it going?" I answered, sounding as chipper as possible.

"Malik, Guess what?!?!" She shouted, sounding so excited about whatever it was that I had to smile.

"What, Isis?"

"I'm going to have a baby!" Wait, what?

"So you're pregnant?" I stammered, somewhat shocked. Wow, Malik. Very sharp. Very intuitive.

"I'm so excited, and Patrick is really happy too! Isn't it amazing?!"

"I'm really happy for you! Congratulations! That's really great." I could see that Yugi and Ryou were trying to look inconspicuous, although it was painfully obvious that they were trying to eavesdrop. "So how far along are you?" I asked, smirking at my friend's reactions. Yugi had tripped, and Ryou's eyes were huge.

"Um, we figured out that I'm about eight weeks along... I'm so excited!"

"Awesome." We talked about that for a few minutes longer, and she asked me how I'd been doing. The second I got off the phone, I was tackled.

"She's pregnant?" Ryou asked calmly, while Yugi shouted,

"Uncle Malik!!" At the top of his lungs. I nodded, my newfound decent mood dissipating when I remembered the obnoxiously tall stack of homework I had waiting for me.

"Yeah... I don't know any more than that, though. I can't really talk right now... I have a shit ton of homework." Thankfully, they dropped the subject, although I could see how curious they were. I had to force myself to focus at the problem immediately on hand. Gods, how I hate math...

* * *

A/N: Hey, everyone... I'm sorry if this chapter has errors that I missed, but I got really bored waiting for my beta (sorry, Krista!), and there's absolutely nothing else to do... I'm in the hospital with a kidney infection, and they won't let me go home!!! I would have probably gone home yesterday, except that my blood pressure was 65 over 33, which is not a good thing. I feel pretty okay, though... except that I have this stupid IV stuck in me, and it hurts. okay, I'm done ranting. I'm just really bored and cranky.

thanks for reading, and I hope you're enjoying it so far. I'm having fun writing it. tell me what you think!!

~alex~


	3. Chapter 3

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Three~

* * *

Shit shit shit I was so late! I'd been up so late the night before, and now I was paying for it. I'd missed the first bus and had had to take the next one, almost an hour later. Although I had zero tardies, I didn't want to take any risks as far as my grades were concerned. Not if I wanted a shot at transferring to a university after this. I burst into the classroom, almost tripping on a bag that was spread acriss the doorway. Marik's, of course. I could feel my face heat up as the entire class stared at me. A couple of them snickered behind their hands. I sank into my seat, trying to make myself as small as possible and attract as little attention as possible.

"Hey, kid." I glanced up when Marik whispered to me, and he slid something at me over the desk. "Here. Thanks for letting me use 'em." Oh, right. It was the notes I'd lent to him on Thursday... My hands were unsteady as I took the notebook from him, and I almost dropped it.

"N-No problem," I stammered. He smirked at me. Why was it that whenever he smiled at me, it was like he was making fun of me?! Maybe I was just being too paranoid. I avoided looking at him the rest of the hour, but he caught up with me after class.

"Yo, Malik." I spun around.

"Huh?" I cringed inwardly at my stupidity.

"What's up?" Well, this was odd... this kind of person didn't usually talk to me unless they wanted me to let them cheat off of me (or use my notes), although one time a guy asked me to transport heroin for him. Do I really look like that kind of person? No, I didn't- and that's why they always tried to recruit me. No one would suspect cute, little, innocent Malik of anything even slightly illegal.

"Uh, n-nothing... just heading off to work." Fortunately, we lived close enough to my job that I could take the bus there and then just walk home, since I didn't have Isis's car to borrow.

"Ouch, that blows." I nodded, unsure what to say.

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Where do you work?" I told him the name of the pizza place, and he nodded, looking mildly interested. Why would he want to know? "That's kinda cool, though, I mean, if you get free pizza, and shit like that." Of course he wanted me to get him free pizza...

"Yeah, when people don't pick up their pizzas, or get mad and try to change their orders after it's already been made." He laughed.

"People suck, don't they?"

"Yeah, they totally do. Although I don't mind when they don't pick up their food, because then I eat free." You know, you'd think that people would learn to be nice to whoever handles their food. Because I can tell you for a fact that if you're a dick to the pizza guy on the phone or whatever, they will blacklist your name and do horrible things to your food. "Yeah, it really sucks."

"Well, hey. I'm not gonna keep you any longer, so... I'll see you on Thursday?"

"Yeah, sure..." I waved awkwardly as I hurried to the bus. As expected, work sucked hardcore. The only consolation was that I brought home two pizzas, which thrilled Yugi and Ryou. Maybe a little too much, especially in Yugi's case; he was so damn excitable. I felt a little better about staying there with them when I could contribute and provide dinner. Sure, they had reassured me countless times that I wasn't causing them any trouble in the slightest, but hey. They're starving college students just like myself. If I could help in any way, then I was more than happy to.

* * *

I talked to Isis a couple more times that week, but it was hard to be as enthusiastic as I should have been. I mean, you can only talk about baby names for so many hours before you want to scream. Marik, too, continued to confuse me, talking to me randomly and out of the blue.

"Hey." I glanced up, surprised.

"Oh, hey, Marik." He looked a little uncomfortable.

"So... what's up?"

"Eh... nothing much."

"You working today?" I shook my head.

"Nope, it's my day off... they've been cutting down a lot on everyone's hours."

"Huh. Well, you doing anything?" Where the hell was this awkward, forced conversation going?

"No. Why?" He shrugged, playing with a pale spike of hair.

"Just wondered. If you're bored, though, you wanna chill at my place for a while?" Well, that was unexpected...

"Uh... I guess so. I mean, if you want me to." Gods, I was sounding like a middle-school girl! He smiled at me.

"Cool. You don't have any more classes after this, right?" I nodded.

"Hey, Ryou!" I called, surprising my pale friend. "Hey. I'm going to hang out with Marik, so don't worry about giving me a ride," I told him, pulling him aside while Marik packed up his stuff. "Okay?" He raised his eyebrows at me.

"Oh really, now?"

"Yeah... what's wrong with that?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing. Just that he _is_ pretty attractive..." Oh, no. He didn't just say that. "And he seems to be kinda interested in you..." Bullshit! Right? Yeah, right.

"Okay, Ryou. I'm leaving, so just shut up." He snickered at my embarrassment.

"Have fuuuuu~uuuuunnnnn!" He sang to me before hurrying away from me, giving me one last wink. Marik must have seen the wink, because he gave Ryou an odd look.

"Who's that?" He asked. "Your boyfriend?" Gah! No!

"No! No, that's just one of my stupid room mates."

" Oh. Cool." Cool? Why was it cool? Because I was single? Or just because? Dammit! He didn't even mean anything about it, and now I was panicking and reading too much into it. We walked in silence to the parking lot, where I was surprised to see that he had a pretty nice car. Not anything _too_ fancy, but pretty good for a college kid. "Here, I'll put that in back." I gave him my bag, and he put it in the trunk. We got to his place quickly- and when I say quickly, I mean _very_ quickly- he drove about seventy the entire way. He lived in an apartment that wasn't too horribly far from downtown- not the best neighborhood, but not horrible, either. All in all, the flat was pretty nice. "So, what do you wanna do?" Wait, he was asking me?

"Um... whatever you want to do." I didn't notice the implications in that statement until after I had said it, but I hoped that he hadn't picked up on it. "I mean, it's your house, after all..." he shrugged.

"Fair enough. In that case, grab a controller." He opened the TV cabinet, revealing stacks and stacks of video games, on every imaginable console. "Alright. I'm getting something to eat. Mac and cheese okay?"

"Yeah, of course." I helped him make the food, and we spent a few hours playing different games. I was pretty pleased that I had won a few times on the new Super Smash Bros game, although I think he might have let me win. We talked about every topic imaginable, which inevitably strayed to family. I learned that, although his parents were still alive and married, he didn't see him much. Both of them were doctors, and they were very busy. More than that, though, was the way they saw Marik's decisions. They didn't approve of most of what he did, especially considering that he wanted nothing to do with medicine, or anything even slightly conventional. From what I could gather, they were paying for his school, housing, food, everything, to get him out of the house and out of their hair.

"So yeah, they're paying for all of this." He gestured to the room around us. "Which is pretty cool of them, I guess, but still. What about your parents?" of course he would ask...

"Well.... they're dead. I've lived with my sister, Isis, since I was seven." His eyes grew wide in shock, but they were strangely empty of pity. Perhaps he knew just how much I loathed being pitied...

"Shit. That blows. Sorry, man."

"Eh, thanks. It's not really that big of a deal now, you know? I mean yeah, I wish they were alive, but there's nothing I can do about it now, and I don't really remember all that much from before they died." Surprisingly enough, the conversation didn't lapse into a huge awkward silence, like usual, and the next thing I knew, it was almost eleven-thirty. "Oh, hey, I'd better be getting back. I don't want anyone to think I got kidnapped or anything..."

"Oh, your sister? And that one guy?"

"No, not my sister anymore. She's getting married, and she's pregnant, so I'm staying with my friends Yugi and Ryou until I get somewhere else," I explained.

"Hey, congrats to your sister! Come on, I'll drop you off."

"Oh, you don't have to," I started to protest.

" I know I don't _have_ to, but we don't want you to _really _get kidnapped, now do we? Besides, I think it's starting to rain." Now that he mentioned it, I could hear faint raindrops on the roof. "Get in the car." I told him where to go, and a few minutes into the ride, I mustered up the courage to ask him what had been on my mind.

"Um... Marik? No offense or anything, and I'm not saying that I didn't enjoy myself, because I did, but... just out of curiosity, why did you invite me over in the first place? I'm not a particularly exciting person." He shrugged.

"I dunno... You seem like a pretty cool guy, and neither of us were doing anything, so I figured hey, why the hell not, you know?" I nodded. "Besides, you're pretty cute." He spoke with such nonchalance, like it was the most normal thing in the world to say and moved on to another topic, but I was stuck, still having a hard time restarting my heart. What the hell had that meant?! The way he said it so casually... and the way it affected me. Why should it matter? It really didn't. Although he was pretty attractive, as Ryou had said, and I tend to get nervous around guys I like, but... Marik? I didn't think I liked him, but I could be mistaken. I shook myself out of my thoughts and rejoined the conversation, which had somehow changed to something about cacti.

"Hey, thanks for the ride," I said awkwardly when he had stopped in the driveway.

"Any time, man. Hey, we should study together, or whatever." He found a pen and scribbled something on a scrap of paper. "There. My number. Just text me later, or whatever, so that I've got your number."

"Oh! Okay! Thanks!" I was glad that it was so dark. I was sure my cheeks were bright red; I could feel the heat rising in them. "Ummm.... I'll see you later, then?"

"See you around." He drove away, and before I even touched the door, it exploded outwards. I was instantly fighting to stay standing as Yugi threw himself on top of me.

"Malik!!!!! How'd it go?!?! Did you kiss?!?!"

"No! Get the hell off of me!" I shouted, shoving Yugi away.

"Aww," he replied, his face falling in disappointment. "That's no fun," he whined.

"Well, sorry for not being more exciting." Ryou came into the living room, saving me from a highly-caffeinated Yugi.

"Hey, Malik. Here, I've been looking at apartments for you like you asked me to." That's right; I would have to find somewhere else to go, as Yami would be moving in with them in a couple of weeks.

"Oh! Thanks- you find anything good?" He shook his head.

"Not too much is open right now. The only thing that you can really afford on a weekly basis is the motel down by the corner of Blakely. It's a pretty good deal, really, all things considered." Hey, Blakely... that was sort of near Marik's house, wasn't it? Not that it mattered, at all, really.

"Alright, I'll look at it. Thank you, very much." I took the printouts that he handed me, and headed to my room. I couldn't help but be pretty excited about being on my own. It wasn't exactly going to be my own place, but anything is better than nothing. At least I wouldn't have to bother anyone for food or anything like that... And maybe, MAYBE, Marik could give me rides every now and then. Yeah, that would be pretty cool actually. But what the hell did he mean by saying that I was cute!?!? he was probably just messing with me to get a rise out of me. Okay, I'll be honest. It was kinda throwing me for a loop... mainly because of the indifferent manner that he usually had around me Wait, why was I letting this get to me? It wasn't like I wanted to really get mixed up with him if I could help it, anyway. He seemed like kind of a thug. But then again, who knows? I might as well give him a chance, right? It wasn't like I had that many friends. Yugi and Ryou would be busy enough in the near future, as soon as Yami got there. When I wasn't working, I always played the "friendless loser" card and sat around doing (or trying to convince myself to do) homework. And he'd said that we should hang out, or study together. That could be useful; I needed to keep my grades up. I was looking forward to this; hopefully, my life would pick up speed a little.

* * *

I hung out with Marik a few times after that, and he even helped me move my one measly bag of possessions into the motel room that I would be renting. He was actually a pretty nice guy... not as much of a delinquent as I had first thought. The only thing that made me somewhat uncomfortable was the way he kept making random comments that _almost_ made it seem like he was hitting on me. But then again, it was Marik. I couldn't tell if he was actually serious, but if I had to guess, I would have said no.

* * *

"Malik, can I talk to you? Please?" Oh no, my boss sounding like that while asking to talk to me... that couldn't be good. Josh, the night manager, sighed heavily once we were in the back room alone. "Malik... I really hate to have to tell you this, but... we're going to have to let you go. It's not anything that you did, it's just... well, you know how slow business has been, and we need someone who can work more flexible hours. I really am sorry, Malik. You can call any time you need a recommendation..." No! No, no, no.... I needed this job! The motel room was cheap, but it wasn't _that_ cheap, that I could just lose my job and be okay... and how was I going to pay for school?!? I forced myself to go back to work. Sure, this might be one of my last shifts, but it was still a shift, and I was still getting paid for it. My mind raced as I went through my options. There was no way I could tell Isis- I didn't want to give her anything else to worry about right about now, and Yugi and Ryou would worry so much that they would just cause more trouble for themselves than anything else. Besides, it wasn't like it was the end of the world. I had a fair amount of money saved up, and that would hopefully hold me until I could find another job. Yeah, the more I thought about it, the less worried I was. Okay, so maybe I was just trying to make myself feel better, but I was calming down quite a bit. Apparently, I would be finishing up the week there, and then I'd be done. See? It gave me even more time to search for a job.

I sighed as I dragged myself through the front door. As much as this sucked, it wouldn't do me any good to keep feeling sorry for myself. Things would work out, one way or another.

* * *

A/N: Hey, everyone. sorry it took me so long to post this. to be honest, I thought I already had posted this chapter, so... yeah. sorry.

So my boyfriend has been having issues with his sexuality, and so we're not really together while he figures it out. yeah, he's probably gay. which would be okay, if he wasn't my boyfriend. dammit. figures. oh well. nothing I can do about it other than whine to whoever will listen, which would be you guys.

but yeah, I'm having a lot of fun with this story, so hopefully, I can keep it up!

let me know what you think!

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

~alex~


	4. Chapter 4

(I don't own anything)

* * *

~Chapter Four~

* * *

Okay, things were definitely not working out. At all. I had... no money left for rent. None. As in, I had to be checked out of the motel room by seven tonight. Fuck my life. I hadn't been able to find a job, because nowhere was hiring! Literally! And everything was all messed up, and I had to pretend like everything was just peachy...

"Malik, what's up with you, man? You've been all weird lately." Shit, if Marik was noticing my strange behavior, then I must be acting really strange. I smiled cheerfully, trying my hardest not to let my worry show.

"Huh? Oh, I'm fine. Really, I'm just pretty stressed out, you know? With school and stuff." He didn't look like he believed me at all.

"Yeah, well, if you need anything, you can ask me for help." Okay, he _totally_ knew something was going on with me.

"Thanks, Marik. I... I appreciate it." I truly did. Perhaps that offer would come in handy later, when I was so desperate that I didn't even care what I looked like, begging for help. When I was starving, and- woah there, Malik. Calm down. That was _not_ going to happen.

* * *

I had already packed my bag in the morning, so later that evening, I just grabbed it and left. And went... absolutely nowhere. Where was I supposed to go? There was no one around who would really want me staying with them- well, no one that I could turn to right now, anyway. Isis... was going to have a baby. I didn't want to make life any more difficult for her than it already was. There was literally no room for me with Yugi, Ryou, and Yami, and I didn't want them freaking out on me and trying to help me and shit. Marik... yeah, he did say that I could call him, but once again, I didn't want to come off as being totally helpless and unable to fend for myself. I just didn't want him to think that of me, and I didn't know him that well. Fuck if I knew why, but I couldn't just show up on his doorstep on a Friday night and beg for him to let me stay there.

Eventually, I remembered the pavilion in the park. It wasn't really meant to sleep under, but it should keep me dry if it rained. And if I really got desperate, I could sleep in the tunnel thing in the playground. Yeah, the park was sounding like a really good idea by now, and I set off to find it. I knew it was around there somewhere... I'd gotten most of the way there, when I noticed the group of very intoxicated men who had just noticed me. I really did not like the looks they were giving me... almost like I was something for sale, and they were appraising me. Yeah, I was definitely not okay with that. Although I hoped that they were just another group of harmless drunks, I was afraid that they were... less harmless. I sped up, and sure enough, they sped up as well. Great. It was night time, I had nowhere to go, and I had a group of drunken hooligans following me. Fuck, fuck fuck fuck! It also didn't help that I didn't really know where I was. Like, I had a basic idea, but I didn't know these streets as well as they seemed to, even in their impaired state. My duffle bag was making things difficult for me, weighing me down as I walked as quickly as I could and just getting in my way. Oh gods, I could hear them gaining on me! I couldn't let them catch me... and yet, they continued to catch up to me! I think what really did me in was the fact that I started to panic. Because, like the moron I am, it didn't take me long to get myself cornered down a blocked-off alley. I spun to face my pursuers, trying to keep my fear out of my body language.

"Can I help you?" I asked them as politely and formally as I could.

"Yeah, I think you can," one of them slurred, chuckling.

"If you know what we mean!" Another one burst out, obviously thinking he was clever. The third one just smiled at me, a sort of horrible grimace that showed all of his yellowing teeth. I couldn't stop the goosebumps from raising across my body. This was so not _right. _This wasn't supposed to happen, but there wasn't anything I could do about it!

"Don't be afraid, sweetie. We're not going to hurt you too much." Shit. Now my back was against the wall... I was surrounded....

"You'll like it. Hell, you were askin' for it, walkin' around like that around here." Shit shit shit shit!

"I'm terribly sorry if I gave you that idea, but I r-really must get going. I have a meeting that I'm late for. They're expecting me." The words sounded _totally_ pathetic, even to me.

"Bullshit. You got nowhere. We _seen_ you coming outta that motel. You're done there, and you got nowhere to go." Shit. How had I not noticed them earlier? Like, when I left? No matter what I did, I had to get out of this....

"Look, you don't want to do this!" I was desperate now. This was, however, _not_ the right thing to say.

"Don't _tell_ me what I want, you bitch!" The man who seemed to be the ringleader growled, smacking me across the face. Fuuuuuuuck, that hurt... I stumbled, dropping my bag and falling to my knees, and that was all the opportunity they needed to pounce on me. Dear gods, please, no.... don't let this be happening! They all laughed cruelly as I struggled against their hands, knowing as well as I did that I didn't stand a chance against all of them at once.

* * *

A/N: Hey, everyone. yes, I realize how painfully short this chapter is... I'm quite sorry. and please don't hate me for doing horrible things to Malik. Why does this kind of thing always happen to my characters? What does that say about me? Probably not anything good. it's like in that article about fanfiction, when it's describing the genre of hurt/comfort. this is the exact wording: "A long time ago a woman sat down at her desk and thought 'How can I best combine my maternal and nurturing instincts with my **massive personality disorder**?' Thus the genre of hurt/comfort was born." I love cracked dot com.

anyway, the next one should be up soon to make up for this one's shortness. thank you all for your kind reviews. I really appreciate them, and I like hearing what everyone has to say. so let me know what you think, okay?

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

~alex~


	5. Chapter 5

(I don't own anything)

* * *

~Chapter Five~

* * *

Oh, gods. Why would this happen to me? What had I done to deserve this? My body was in so much pain... I felt like I was dying. Actually, I would have liked to have died right about then. Seriously, just... where was I going? I had no clue what I was doing at all, or where I was going. My head was hurting, and I was just so totally disgustingly filthy... I was panicking. I was panicking and hyperventilating and it was making my body hurt even more... in my abdomen, where he'd punched me, on my cheek, where the other man had slapped me, on my chest, where they'd sat on me... everywhere hurt. Everywhere their hands had been was in agony... and they'd touched every part of me. Everywhere I didn't want them to touch me... gods, it was awful, and now I was just horribly dirty. I couldn't take it; I really couldn't. I could feel tears on my cheeks, even though I didn't remember when I'd started crying. I didn't know how long it had been since they'd left me lying there down that dead-end (more like a "wish-I-were-dead-end") alley, covered in blood and dirt and sweat and tears and- and- dear gods, they'd been laughing when they left me... one of them had called me a whore and spit on me as they left me. Gods, I could still feel their hands on me! In my hair, under my clothes... I couldn't get it out of my mind... I couldn't see very well, either, between the fact that it was dark and I'd been crying, and it was getting windy... I tripped on something, and when I got my bearings, I realized that I was laying on a front step. Not just any front step, either. I knew this place, but why? I couldn't place it... oh no, I felt like throwing up. Again. I don't think I had anything left in me to throw up again, even if I wanted to. If I could reach that doorbell, I would be all set, but it was so far away, so high up... no! I had to be able to reach it... I just had to stretch a little higher... there. I felt my fingers brush over the button, and I pushed it as hard as I could- two, three, four times before I sank back to the ground, holding on to my self tightly. I couldn't even look to see who opened the door, but I could hear the horrified gasp.

"M-Malik? What the fuck happened to you?" Despite the ferocity of the words, the voice was more concerned than angry. I struggled, opening my eyes as I felt a pair of gentle hands on me.

"Marik..." I whispered, for some reason feeling relief wash over me when I saw who was holding on to me. His expression was one that showed every thought that was going through his mind. He looked shocked and surprised, and at the same time very angry, like he wanted to go kill someone. Also, though, he looked... sad. Like he wanted to cry.

"Malik," he murmured, gently picking me up in his arms. Gods, he was strong. "Malik, what- what happened?" He really even had to ask? Wasn't it obvious? I shook my head violently, making him hold onto me even more tightly. "Who did this to you, Malik?"

I hesitated. For one thing, I hadn't known any of the men. For another thing, I didn't want to talk about anything, let alone this.

"Malik?" his voice was so kind, so soothing...

"There...there were..." I hid my face again, holding tightly to his shirt as if it was my only lifeline. "Five of them..." I muttered, not wanting him to hear it, not wanting him to know. He gasped again, his grip tightening on me.

"Those bastards! I'll fucking kill them..." He took me into the other room and lay me down on a bed, where I immediately curled up as tightly as possible. "Malik... I'm going to take you to the hospital, okay?" I jerked violently. He couldn't- there was no way that would be okay! It wouldn't work! I had no insurance, and I didn't want Marik to know so much. He couldn't. He... he wouldn't ever want me. When did I suddenly care about _that_ so much? Until now, hadn't even know that I liked him in that way. I felt the tears start up again. It wasn't fair. As soon as I realize what I want, the gods screw me over and make it so that there was no way it could ever happen...

"NO! Don't! Please, don't don't don't! Don't take me in, I don't want to!" I burst out, crying profusely.

"Malik, why not? You're hurt! You're bleeding! They-they hurt you!"

"No! You can't take me in! I don't want them to know; I don't want _you_ to know, and to hate me!" Oh shit! I covered my mouth with my hands. Why did I have to say it out loud? He wasn't supposed to know. He couldn't know! I shook my head again, trying to back away from him and unable to look at him.

"Malik." His voice was so nice, and he just- he just- he sounded so perfect, and then there was me, and I- "Malik! Calm down. Look at me, Malik. _Look at me,_ and breathe." Breathe? How was I supposed to do that? "Malik, please look at me..." His voice... the way he said my name... he didn't want to hurt me. He actually _cared_that I was hurt... I opened my eyes, forcing myself to meet Marik's identical pair. "There we go," he murmured. That look he was giving me... what did it mean? And were those tears in his eyes? No, couldn't be. Probably just a shadow...

"I'm sorry, Marik," I choked out.

"Sorry? Why the fuck are you sorry?"

"Be-because!" I sobbed. "I just show up at your place without warning, and-"

"Malik, you're _hurt_!"

"And then freaking out on you, and I'm sorry, goddamn I'm pathetic. Look at me, just crying and shit. I can't even protect myself against drunks-"

"You said there were five of them! Of course you can't protect yourself against five of them at once!"

"No, and now- now- now I'm all disgusting, and you'll never want me, and oh fuck, I'm sorry." There. I'd said it. Now he was gonna realize what I'd meant by it, and get all freaked out that another guy liked him, and he was going to hate me and think that I was disgusting and a whore and- and- and _gods_, I felt disgusting! I flinched as a hand caressed my cheek.

"Malik..." He tilted my head back so that he could see me better. "Malik, you're worried that I won't want you?" See? He was going to laugh at me now...

"I'm- I'm- sorry," I whimpered, enjoying the feel of his soothing hand on my cheek despite the circumstances. Still, I couldn't stop the tears that coursed down my cheeks, nor could I still the tremors that ran through my body.

"Malik," he sighed again, this time sounding tired. Yeah, I'd be pretty tired of me too, if I had to be someone else... "Malik, would it make you feel better to know that if you weren't hurt and upset, and you came here wanting to be with me, that I would, without hesitation, fuck the living daylights out of you?" He smiled at my shocked expression. "And not just because I'm a total slut, either. I like you." Hah. Yeah, funny. He was a slut? Did he realize who he was talking to? As if I didn't feel horrible enough before, without him making fun of me... he must have noticed my expression, or read my mind, or something, because he pulled me closer to his body. I was too exhausted to try to resist, and to be honest, I liked his touch. So I just let him hold on to me. At least I could pretend like he wanted me... "Malik, I'm serious, dude. You're fucking hot, okay?" Yeah? Look where it got me. "And you're a cool guy. I meant it when I said you were cute. Actually, it was kind of an understatement, considering how fucking sexy you are." He _couldn't_ mean it.

I shook my head. "Marik, why would you even look twice at-at-at- someone like me?" I was crying _again_, goddammit. "I-I'm boring as hell. You're totally badass, and totally hot, and you're smart, and-and funny, and nice... and why would you like me? Shit, you wouldn't. You hardly even know me." I was breathing hard, tears trickling down my cheeks.

"Malik," he said carefully, gently pushing my hair out of my face. "Malik, you're right that I hardly know you, but I know you well enough to know that I _want_ to know you better. I know that you're... different from most people, and no, you _aren't_ pathetic. When was the last time you looked in a mirror and really _looked_ at yourself? Malik, you- shit, dude. You're fucking gorgeous." No matter how untrue the compliment might be, I still had to smile. I sneezed, shivering violently. "Dammit! I'm sorry, Malik. I should have gotten you cleaned up by now..." Shit! No! He was going to try to get me clean? That would mean him touching me. Lots. In places that had already been touched _way_ too much for today. Or ever as far as I was concerned. "Don't worry about it, Malik," he whispered as my body tensed. "I promise that I will not hurt you. Okay? You need to get cleaned up and into bed, though." No, I would be perfectly fine. I didn't care if I lived or died at the moment. "Malik, don't even _try_ to protest. I am _going_ to take care of you, whether you want me to or not. I don't want you to die, and since you wont go to a doctor, it's my responsibility to take care of you." I… I guess I could handle that. Maybe. "Malik... you're staying here tonight. Do you need to call anyone? Or get anything from your place?"

I shook my head, gesturing to the duffle bag that he'd brought in with me. "That's everything."

"Why do you have everything you own with you?" Shit, no... I didn't want him to know everything! I'd kind of gotten myself into telling him, though.

"I-I couldn't pay the rent for the motel room... so they kicked me out." I couldn't look at him.

"But your job-"

"I got laid off," I cut in, leaving him staring at me blankly.

"Why?"

"Because it's a slow time of year, and they wanted someone who could work more flexible hours. So I've been looking for a new one for like a week, but I couldn't find one because no one is hiring. So they kicked me out."

"They kicked you out tonight?" I nodded. "Good. At least you weren't homeless for too long." No, but the fact remained that I _was_ still homeless, and now- gods, I would die if I had to go out there on my own, but really, I had nowhere else to go. Those guys were probably still out there, and even if they weren't, there would be someone else just as bad to replace them. Basically, I was fucked. Literally. "Malik, you're planning on looking somewhere else tonight, aren't you? You're planning on just skipping out on me?" Well, what else was I supposed to do?

"Yeah... I don't really have a choice-"

"Bullshit. You're staying here tonight. And until you can find your own place."

"W-what? No! I can't!"

He frowned at me. "Why the fuck not? You're not going anywhere in that shape."

"B-because there's no room here. Where would I sleep? I'm not taking your bed from you."

"Malik, you're sleeping in that bed if I have to tie you to it. No, don't give me that look. I'll sleep on the futon. You're hurt; it's the least I can do. Besides, I already told you that you should tell me if you need anything."

"But-"

He put up his hand, glaring at me. "Malik, shut up. Okay? Just shut up. I don't want to have to drug you, but if that's what it comes down to, I will." Somehow, I didn't think he was joking. There wasn't really much I could do about it, and I was exhausted... so maybe... I tried to stand, but felt the world spinning as I did. "Woah, hey... you okay there? Careful, man. Here, let me help you." The last thing I saw before passing out were his eyes staring at me with concern. Gods, they were beautiful, and once again, despite the shitty circumstances, I couldn't help but feel pleased that he cared enough about me to be worried.

* * *

A/N: See? I told you I'd make up for the shortness. I'm glad that everyone seems to be liking this... I've been feeling kinda angsty, just in case you couldn't tell by my writing :D

*many thanks to soundofmadness223* we both apologize for the long wait for this chapter. we really need to get our shit together. :P

thanks for reading! I'll update soon this time, I promise.


	6. Chapter 6

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Six~

* * *

I opened my eyes, wondering- for a brief moment- why my body hurt so badly. And then I remembered the events of the previous day. I clenched my eyes shut, trying to just go back to sleep and forget everything for a few more hours. I lay there for close to fifteen minutes, unable to fall back asleep, before I decided that the only thing I could do at the moment was get up- or try to get up, at any rate. The second I attempted to pull myself into a siting position, searing pains shot through my body. I whimpered quietly, gritting my teeth.

"Malik? You awake?" I jumped, wincing as the involuntary movement caused small twinges of pain. I hadn't realized that Marik was awake yet.

"Yeah..." I answered tentatively, still feeling self-conscious and ashamed that he had seen me at my worst.

"How're you feeling?"

"Awful," I told him. He sighed sadly.

"Shit, dude. I'm sorry. You want me to get you something to eat?" Ugh, the thought of food made my stomach churn, even though I'd had nothing to eat since... well, since lunch the day before.

"No thanks... I don't feel like I could keep much down even if I tried..."

"Oh... um, okay..." I managed to sit up, immediately wondering how I'd gotten changed into pajamas. Shit... Had Marik changed my clothes after I passed out? That was not good. He would have seen even more of what had been done to me... I buried my face in my hands, my cheeks burning in shame. This was just **not** how things were supposed to work out. He was supposed to think I was cool, not a pathetic little punk who can't fend for himself. I jumped in alarm as I felt his arm snake around my shoulder, but he didn't remove it. "Malik, it'll be okay. I promise."

"How can you even say that?" I whispered.

"Because." He kissed the top of my head, and I couldn't decide whether I liked it or dreaded the contact... I decided that liking it would just be easier. "I'm going to take care of you."

"What? But I can't pay for rent, and-"

"Shut up. Okay? I'm not asking you if you want to stay with me, I'm telling you that you're going to, and if you know what's good for you, you won't try to argue about it." Well, in that case, I guess it would be okay...

"Are you sure?" He rolled his eyes.

"Goddammit, Malik! Of course I'm sure."

"Um... okay then... thank you."

"But... I still think you should have something to eat. I don't want you to die on me or anything. Besides, you'd probably feel better if you ate something." Okay, he might have had a point... But how was I supposed to tell him that I couldn't get myself out of the bed?

"Alright, I guess. But-"

"Okay, cool. I'll be right back." Wait, he was bringing me food? Breakfast in bed? This was too bizarre. He came back a few minutes later with two pieces of toast. "Here, this should be easy on your stomach." He pushed the small plated towards me, and I forced myself to accept it. It did tasted good, and I hadn't really realized how hungry I had been.

"Thanks..." I muttered, as he handed me a glass of water.

"No problem. Anything else you want me to get you? You know, so you're not bored all day?"

"What do you mean?"

"You know, food, or whatever, or here, you can use my gameboy."

"Wait, what?"

"Well, I'm not letting you out of the bed today, except for using the bathroom."

"Why?"

"Well duh, Malik. You're hurt. I'm taking care of you. Shut up and don't argue about it." Well, that didn't really leave me much of a choice, now did it? "Now, did you want me to get you anything else?" I shifted slightly, wincing as pain shot through my body.

"Actually... do you have any Tylenol or anything like that?"

"Yep. I'll get you a bottle."

"I don't need a whole bottle," I called after him, but he was already in the next room, pretending not to hear me.

"Here." He tossed the bottle at me. "Now if you want anything else, just wake me up. I'm taking a nap." And without another word, he crawled under the blanket on the futon where he had slept the night before, his feet hanging just over the end of it. He was really tall, and the futon wasn't exactly long enough for him. It was a nice futon, and it looked comfortable, but I still felt bad taking the bed away from him. I glanced at the clock on the wall. What the fuck? Who takes a nap at 12:30 in the afternoon? Within five minutes, I could tell that he'd fallen asleep. Whatever... at this point, I'd figured out that he was a pretty strange guy. For some reason, though, I really liked him. And strangely enough, I trusted him. I felt safer in that room when he was sleeping on the futon next to me than I did when he wasn't there. His presence was sort of soothing, and just the way he acted like he was going to take care of me regardless was quite comforting. Soon, I was feeling sleepy myself, and now that the Tylenol was kicking in, I was getting really comfortable. I hadn't been planning on falling asleep after breakfast, but it seemed like a really good idea, especially considering how peaceful Marik looked...

* * *

"Malik? You okay there?" I opened my eyes to see Marik's concerned face.

"Um... I think so? Why?" He frowned.

"Well, you were sorta freaking out and crying..." Oh, shit! I put a hand up to my face, and sure enough, my cheeks were wet with tears. How had I been crying in my sleep? That was such a weird thing to do...

"Oh. No, I'm fine... sorry about that. Did I wake you up from your nap?" He smiled.

"Do you have any idea what time it is?" Well, now that he mentioned it, no... "It's almost six."** !**

"In the evening?" He nodded. "Shit..."

"Well, you kind of needed it... Do you feel any better?" I nodded, realizing that I did feel quite a bit better. Not perfect, but all things considered, pretty good. He looked a little uncomfortable. "Listen, Malik... I'm sorry." Oh, shit. Here it came, he was going to kick me out, or tell me that he didn't want me here, or- "I called my dad." Huh?

"Um..."

"My dad's a doctor." Oh, fucking hell no!

"No! I don't want him to know or you to know or anyone!" He put his hands up, trying to calm me.

"Malik, I didn't tell him anything specific! He's not going to come here to see you, and he won't even know it was you. No one will know a thing. I just wanted to ask for his advice... he really thinks you should go to a doctor or the hospital, but I told him that you probably wouldn't be up for that." Yeah, that was true. There was no way I was going to tell anyone what had happened. Hell, I hadn't even told Marik; he just sort of put things together. "That aside, he said that you need to have plenty of rest, but that you need to eat so that you don't get run down. He also doesn't want you to exert yourself too much, and I'm supposed to be really 'careful and sensitive' around you. He told me not to hit on you, but I told him I didn't think you'd really mind." Oh, Gods! I could feel my face heating up.

"You told him that?" He scowled.

"Was I wrong?" Well, no...

"That's not exactly what I meant, but still... oh man." This was so humiliating, and I didn't want to think about it.

"So you _do_ like me!" He stated smugly, looking really pleased with himself.

"Yeah..." I wasn't sure if I should be admitting this to him... I mean yeah, I did, but I still didn't really think that anything would come of it.

"Awesome. That makes me so happy, you have no idea."

"Why?"

"Because I like you..." He said slowly, as if it were an obvious thing and I was just being stupid.

"No you don't." There was no way he could. At all. Especially now.

"Yeah, I do." He looked slightly irritated, but I had to explain what I meant.

"No, what I mean is that really, you'll probably decide that you don't like me, even if you think you do now."

"Oh? And how do you figure?" I stared at my shaking hands, fumbling with my fingers.

"W-Well, for one thing, I'm boring as hell. I don't do anything exciting, and now I don't have either a job or a home."

"You're living with me!"

"Only until I can function... and now you really won't want me, because... ugh." I shuddered at the thought of how totally gross what had happened to me was, and how Marik would probably figure that out, also. "So you know... you'll see." He lay down where he was sitting, on the end of the bed, so that he was uncomfortably close to me.

"Come on, Malik. Stop that. It's bullshit, and you know it." No, it wasn't! "I _do _want you. You have no idea." Okay, he really needed to stop coming closer to me... I was beginning to feel like I couldn't breathe. "But I don't just _want_ you, I like you. I don't want to hurt you. I don't want to freak you out any more than I am right now just by being near you." Shit. So he'd noticed me hyperventilating? "Malik, I'm taking care of you because I want to. Because I like you, even if you're too stupid to believe it." Well, that was sort of a back-handed compliment... It was nice, though, and I thought I might, _might_ believe him...

* * *

A/N: Hey! I got another chapter out! unfortunately, I don't think I've got another finished in my notebook, so I should probably get working on that... I've got 33 hours this week at work, so I'll hopefully have more time to work on stuff next week, and then I'll have money. :) which is good. :)

Also got a new bf, if you care. :D He's nice. He likes my rats. :D

thank you all for reading, and thanks for the reviews. I love them; they make me very happy.

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

let me know what you think! I like this chapter, but I'm a little biased.

~alex~


	7. Chapter 7

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter 7~

* * *

"Rise and shine, sleepyhead!" I groaned as I felt Marik's weight at the foot of the futon. After two days of sleeping on the bed, I'd insisted on giving back his bed in favor of the futon. The first day, he wouldn't even let me out of bed, until I begged him to let me go to the bathroom. I did notice, though, that regardless of how rough he acted, or how much he joked with me, he hadn't touched me. Not once. Which was nice, if I could be sure he was just doing it to make me feel more comfortable, but I had this ridiculous idea (yeah, I knew it was probably not right, but still, I couldn't get it out of my head) that it was because he didn't actually want me. I was a little hung up on the thought of him liking me. What can I say? I liked him a lot. Not that anyone could blame me, though. He was totally sexy, and really, he was a cool person. Even if he was a little annoying at seven in the morning.

"Don't wanna."

"Come on, Malik. We're going to school." Shit. School. Not something I wanted to deal with right now.

"Why?" I whined, sounding like a spoiled third-grader.

"Because we have to. You said yourself how important your grades and stuff were..." Yeah, well, look where that had gotten me?

"But..." Well, I guess if I wanted to get a decent job, I would have to go to school still. "Fine. I'm up." I sat up, and he immediately got off the bed, going to stand by the door of the room.

"Awesome. Now get dressed; I'll get breakfast." When he said that, he meant that he'd get the cereal out of the cupboard and maybe grab a couple of bowls. Hey, breakfast is breakfast, and I was more than happy to live off of cereal for as long as I would be staying.

* * *

"Malik, why didn't you call me baaaack!" Shit. I had totally forgotten to call Yugi. Well, sorry Yugi. I was a little busy being attacked to think about it. Not that I could say that.

"Sorry, my phone died," I lied.

"So that's why you didn't call Isis, either?" Ryou asked, appearing from seemingly nowhere to stand next to Yugi and me.

"Wait, what?"

"Yeah," Yugi chimed in. "She called us both. You should probably call her as soon as we're out of class. She seemed really worried about you." How in the name of Ra had I forgotten that she would want to talk to me and check in with me? Gods, I'm stupid.

"Crap. Yeah, I'd better call her." I shot Marik a look across the classroom, where he was "finishing" his homework (aka BS'ing the entire assignment ten minutes before class). He shrugged at me, as if telling me that I was on my own dealing with my hyperactive friends. Thanks, Marik. I hadn't told Yugi and Ryou that I was staying with Marik, and to be honest, I wasn't sure if I wanted to tell them at all. Not that they would mind in the slightest- rather, they would harass me to no end with sexual jokes and innuendos, which gets old really quickly. Even after the teacher entered the room and began the lesson, I was having a hard time focusing on the lesson. Every little thing going on in the room caught my attention- from the band kid in the second row tapping his pencil like it was a drum set, to the way the faucet by the far window refused to stop dripping, to the weird (but nice) girl who sat next to me scribbling away at what was definitely not notes- not for this class, anyway. Not unless we were taking a course on Yaoi fanfiction. With her, the less I know, the better, I figure. And, of course, there was Marik to distract me. Always Marik.

* * *

"Malik, what's up with you today? Did something happen?" Ryou cornered me after class. Damn, he's a sneaky one... I never see him coming.

"Um, what do you mean?" I laughed kind of nervously. I should have known that Ryou would pick up on my behavior... I mean, he noticed that something was wrong before, didn't he?

"You're acting weird." Well, that was broad.

"How so?" See with Ryou, it's always best to just play stupid, because otherwise, he'll act like he knows more than he really does, and he'll get you to give away whatever it is you didn't want to tell him. It's like in the detective movies, when the detective says that they already know what happened, so the criminal tells them stuff that they didn't actually know.

"You're walking sort of funny, you can't sit still, you're more jumpy than usual, and you have a bruise under your eye." Well, isn't he just observant today.

"I think you're imagining things." He rolled his eyes, clearly not buying it.

"Okay, maybe with your behavior, but what about the bruise? What's that from?"

"I don't even remember, man. You know how clumsy I can be."

"Uh-huh." Aw, man! He wasn't even going to pretend to believe me? "What does this have to do with Marik?"

"What do you mean by that? Why would you think he has anything to do with it?" I snapped, sounding just a little too defensive to go unnoticed.

"Because you've been staring at him all day, and when you're not staring at him, he's staring at you. What, is he a little rougher than you'd expected?" It took a moment for Ryou's words to register.

"What-no! I mean, we didn't do anything! I swear!" I could feel the blush spreading across my cheeks, and I could see that my outburst had attracted the one person I didn't want getting involved in this conversation.

"Hey, what's up?" Ryou turned to fix Marik with a cold glare. "Woah, man. What's with the look?"

"Did you hurt Malik?" Marik looked taken aback.

"**Ryou!**" I shrieked, horrified that he would just come out and _ask _him like that.

"Well," Ryou retorted, turning to face me as I covered my face with my hands in embarrassment. "I want to make sure. You're acting all off, and I know you were there last night."

"What?" Shit! How much did he know?

"Calm down. I haven't been spying on you or anything weird like that, but I saw you two in the car this morning." Oh. That was... a little better.

"So he gave me a ride to school. What's wrong with that?" How the fuck would he know that I spent the night there?

"You brush your teeth in the car when an acquaintance gives you a ride to school?" Yes, actually. I did.

"Ryou, man, chill." Thank you, Marik, for stepping in and saving me. "I didn't hurt him at all. You can question him all you want, but I swear, I didn't do a thing to him." Ryou turned to me, and I nodded.

"Why should I believe you?"

"Because," Marik said, flashing him his sexiest smile. I couldn't help feeling just a tiny bit jealous. "I like him far too much to hurt him." My face turned three shades darker, and it had already been pretty red. Ryou still didn't look convinced.

"It's okay, Ryou. I'm..." I glanced at Marik, unsure if he would mind me saying this. "I'm kind of staying with him for a while." I'd decided that it was inevitable anyway, so I might as well tell them now. Ryou raised his eyebrows in surprise.

"What happened with the motel?"

"I couldn't afford it. I, um, sort of got laid off at my job..." I braced myself for the explosion that I knew was imminent.

"WHAT? And you didn't tell us? When the bloody hell did that happen?" Goddammit.

"This is why I didn't tell you!" I wailed back. "I knew you would freak the fuck out!"

"Shitty excuse and you know it. Now, how long ago did you lose your job?" I shrugged.

"Couple weeks ago. Really, it's not that big of a deal."

"Not that big of a deal? How are you going to pay for school and shit? How are you going to find somewhere cheap enough to live?" Marik raised his right hand slightly.

"Pardon me, but that won't be a problem. Malik is welcome to stay with me for as long as is necessary. In fact, I'm insisting that he stay with me until he is financially stable." Ryou raised an eyebrow at him.

"Oh really? And you're just doing this, you know, out of the kindness of your heart?" Malik smirked.

"Not necessarily. As I said, I like him a lot. This way, I get to keep him around longer."

"Uh-huh... and so, what does Malik owe you? What do you expect from him in return?" The tone of Ryou's voice made it pretty clear exactly what he meant, and I swear I have never wanted to just murder him on the spot as much as I did at that moment.

"Malik owes me nothing," Marik said seriously, all hints of his joking, light-hearted teasing gone. Instead, he fixed Ryou with a gaze at least as intense as Ryou's. "I expect nothing in return from him, and he is free to leave whenever he wants. I would not try to force him to do something that he doesn't want to do." His words held such finality that it was obvious that he was being sincere. Nobody is _that_ good of an actor. Seemingly satisfied that Marik was being completely honest, Ryou nodded once in... what, approval? Acceptance? I didn't even care, right about then. Pretty much, all I wanted to do was get out of there.

"Alright. I'm sorry I suspected you earlier."

"No, no. I'm just impressed by how adamant you are when it comes to his wellbeing. Malik, I'll meet you in the car, okay?" I nodded, knowing that he was trying to give me some time alone with Ryou.

"Malik, are you sure you're alright?" I paused, and that was all that Ryou needed to jump to (wrong) conclusions. "Shit! What did he do to you? Are you okay? Do you need me to help-"

"Ryou, calm down! Listen, he didn't do anything to me. He's been helping me these last few days. I swear, that's all. He didn't even touch me." Unfortunately.

"Why did you need him to help you? Why couldn't you call me, or Yugi, or your sister for crying out loud? You know she and Patrick would have let you stay again." Dammit, Ryou, this was not the time or place I wanted to discuss this! Not that I wanted to discuss it at all.

"Look. I don't really want to talk about everything that's happened in the last like, four days, but I really appreciate your concern, and I'm very sorry that I worried you and Isis. Trust me, Ryou. I'll be okay. Plus, it helps that he's really sexy." I decided to try to lighten up the conversation. Ryou, however, was having none of that.

"How do you know you can trust him? What if he tries something funny?" I laughed humorlessly.

"Ryou, listen. If he was going to try anything, he would have by now."

"You don't know that! He might wait for just the right moment, when you're like, weak, or can't protect yourself?" Ha.

"If that was the case, then he would have already hurt me. Just believe me when I say that he had the perfect opportunity to take advantage of me. Like I said, he didn't so much as come in physical contact with me." After he redressed me. We'll just leave that little detail out. "And he brought me breakfast in bed." Shit. Did I say too much? Ryou would probably want to know why I was in such a state of vulnerability, and why I needed breakfast brought to me in bed. He was certainly giving me a strange look. Finally, he sighed and shook his head.

"You're not going to tell me anything more, are you?" I shook my head, smiling at him.

"Nope."

"Fine." He sighed again. "Then I guess I'll just drop it. Go call your sister, okay? I'll see you tomorrow. If he hurts you at all, though..." He didn't finish his threat, which was never a good thing with Ryou. It usually meant that he was formulating a plot, and his plans usually worked.

"Dude, he's not going to do anything, so just chill. I'll talk to you later." I pulled my phone out as I walked to the car. Wow, Isis. Way to leave 14 voice mails... but what if they were urgent? What if something horrible had happened to her, and she couldn't reach me? I couldn't dial the number quickly enough, holding the phone to my ear with shaking hands.

"Hello? Malik? Is that you?" Oh, boy. I could just envision her, wringing her hands and fidgeting with worry.

"Yes, Isis. I'm really sorry I didn't call-"

"Than the gods you're okay!" She gushed. "Why didn't you call? I was so worried that something terrible had happened to you." Hey, for once, her worrying wasn't in vain. Not that she could ever know that. "And then when I called the motel, they said you'd checked out. So I called Yugi and Ryou, but they didn't know where you were, either. I-"

"Isis, let me talk, please," I cut in. "I'm okay, but I got laid off my job. I couldn't pay for the motel, so I had to check out, but I'm staying with a friend right now."

"Who are you staying with? Do I know this friend?" I groaned. Of course she would get all motherly over this kind of thing...

"No, Isis. You don't know him yet. His name is Marik, and Ryou already threatened him, so you don't have to worry about my safety." She was silent. "It was a joke, sis. A joke."

"I know, but... should I be worried? I mean, hypothetically, if Ryou hadn't threatened him, would he still be so courteous?"

"Yes. Believe me. Okay? He's a really cool guy. I think you'll like him."

"Oh, so I can meet him?" As much as I didn't want her to, I thought it would probably be a good idea.

"Yeah, but not tonight or anything. We'll have to arrange a date for us to meet up together. How's that sound?"

"Well... I would rather meet him now, but I guess that's alright... just be careful. And Malik, if you need anything, you can always come to me... or if you need to talk about something." No, I can't. "You could have come back to the house for a few weeks. Patrick wouldn't mind." Yeah, right.

"Isis, you do realize that Patrick hates me?"

"Malik! No he doesn't!"

"Whatever. It's not a big deal; Marik and I get along really well." I blushed as soon as the words were out of my mouth, but my sister, being the very literal person she is, didn't pick up on the possible underlying meanings of the phrase. "Look, I have to go. I'll call you tomorrow, I promise."

"You'd better. And I want to meet this Marik kid." I smiled.

"Sure. See you later. Love you."

"Love you too." -_snap_- I closed my phone just as Marik pulled up to the front entrance where I was waiting.

"Hey, perfect timing," I told him as I buckled my seatbelt.

"Oh? Why's that?"

"I just got off the phone with my sister. She wants to meet you."

"Oh. Alright, then. Tell me how I should behave so that she doesn't take you away from me." I blinked at the blunt way he spoke.

"Um... I don't know. Just be yourself. You're cool. We don't have to get together with her tonight, though. We're going to set something up." He was silent for a moment.

"So... you're free tonight?"

"Yeah."

"Starting when?"

"Now."

"Cool. We're going to have fun." Oh, dear Ra. This could get interesting...

* * *

A/N: again, sorry it took me a while. I tried to upload it the other day, but then I got distracted and forgot. :/ I'm very sorry, I know there is no excuse :P

Krista's in California, so I'm sad :( but she'll be back on saturday. so as always, many thanks to **soundofmadness223**.

also thanks to everyone who reviews, and thanks especially to **Little Ryuu** for the message. :)

sooo, I hope you liked it! let me know!

~alex~


	8. Chapter 8

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Eight~

* * *

I wasn't exactly sure what Marik's idea of fun entailed, and I wasn't really sure what to expect. As it turned out, I didn't have to worry, because he was leaving the decision making up to me.

"So what do you want to do?"

"I dunno." I shrugged. "What do you want to do?" I hate making decisions. He rolled his eyes.

"Are we really going to do this?"

"Do what?"

"Refuse to make decisions and then just keep asking each other what we want to do." I couldn't help but be reminded of the Disney version of "Jungle Book," where the vultures are sitting in the tree, and the one says 'What'cha want to do?' And the other says, 'Dunno. What do you want to do?' And the third says, 'Oh! Don't start that again!' I didn't tell Marik this.

"Well, I don't want to decide. After all, I'm the one who invaded your house."

"Yeah, and I'm pretty sure that guests are supposed to decide what to do. I think that's polite." Since when did he care about manners?

"Well, that's unfortunate, because I don't want to decide."

"Okay, whatever. Let's stop by my place and drop our stuff off. We can decide from there." Sounded good. When we arrived, though, there was a car that I didn't recognize parked outside. Marik, however, apparently recognized the car. "Son of a bitch, what's he doing here?" He turned to me. "Okay, so my friend is here... he probably broke into my house again." Wait, again? "He's kind of strange." Yeah, I'll say. "I apologize if he offends you at all..." This could be sort of interesting... I nodded, and we went inside to find a tanned, white-haired guy with a long scar across his right eye rummaging through the refrigerator. He looked up at us.

"Hey, Marik, dude. You gotta get something better to eat; you got shit."

"Bakura, the reason I have shit is because I have to put up with friends like you who come in and eat everything in my kitchen."

"Oh? And what about him?" Bakura was looking at me intensely. "Who's he, other than a really nice piece of ass?" Oh, so that's what Marik had meant about him offending me. "You didn't tell me about him." Marik was glaring at him.

"For one thing, Bakura, he's staying with me, so I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't insult my guests. For another thing- Goddammit, Bakura, stop that!" Bakura was winking at me and licking his lips, and just making all sorts of suggestive gestures. It _was_ making me a little uncomfortable... "Bakura, let me talk to you in the other room for a moment." Bakura threw his hands in the air defensively.

"What? I'm not doing anything! I'm not insulting him! Why would I do that and shoot all my chances of getting laid?" Woah, when had that come up? "Unless he's yours. Which is understandable if you want to keep him to yourself. Although you could share." He turned to me. "So, how would you feel about a threesome?" Oh gods no. I flinched badly, and he seemed to realize that he'd said something wrong. "Or not, you know. If-"

"Bakura, get in there right this instant," Marik demanded. Bakura gave me a slightly apologetic look and went into the bedroom. Malik followed him in, slamming the door behind him. Oh, gods. What would he tell Bakura? I didn't want this stranger knowing everything. In fact, I couldn't have him know everything. I heard the hushed voices in the other room stop completely for a moment, then resume, slightly louder and more agitated. Okay, I was going crazy here trying to figure out what was going on in there. I had to do something to calm myself down... I set my stuff down and began cleaning up the stuff that Bakura had strewn about the kitchen. It still hurt a little, and my hands were shaking because of my one-sided conversation with Bakura, but I did my best to ignore both. When the two came out of the bedroom a moment later, Bakura looked abashed, and Marik looked slightly less irritated.

"Aww, Man! You didn't have to do that!" Bakura exclaimed when he saw that I had cleaned up after him.

"It's not a big deal, really," I told him, shrugging.

"Well, thanks... it was nice meeting you. See you around." He headed out the door, and Marik sighed, rubbing his eyes wearily.

"Gods, he wears me out. Sorry about that..." I shrugged awkwardly again. I didn't really want him to know how uncomfortable I was, but he probably knew, knowing him. "Listen, Malik..." Shit. I didn't like that tone of voice. It was the same tone that Patrick used when he was going to kick me out. "Listen, I didn't tell him everything, okay?" I blinked. That wasn't what I had been expecting him to say. I don't know what I had been expecting, but it hadn't been good. "Just that you'd had some trouble with a group of men, and that he should probably tread lightly around you." I opened my mouth, starting to panic- that might as well have been everything- but Marik put his hand up to silence me. "It's okay, Malik. Bakura's a good guy, really, even if he doesn't seem like it at first, and he's a good one to have on your side. Trust me. When it comes to anything even slightly shady, he'll make sure that if you're okay. Now that you're on his list of people to look out for, you should be safe." Well, that was good... I guess... "He's just a little difficult to get used to. Don't worry." Yeah, that was easier said than done. There was still something about the whole issue that was making me wonder, but there was no way in hell that I could ever say anything about it to Marik. When Bakura had suggested that Marik wanted to keep me all to himself, he hadn't said anything to the contrary. Did that mean that he did want me? Eh, probably not, but hey. A guy can dream, can't he? "Sorry that he kind of threw a wrench in our fun plans. Not that we really had any, but you know what I mean."

"No, no. It's okay. I need to work on that stupid stuff for our class, anyway." He nodded.

"Well, we could work on that together, if you want. You're probably doing a million times better than me, so you should help me." Of course I would help him! "You wanna play a game later, or something?"

"Sure. That sounds good." And so we worked on our homework for that stupid 'Principles of Chemistry' class for almost three hours. It was to that point in the afternoon where you just start getting really sleepy, though, and I felt myself drifting off. Well, it couldn't hurt to take a little nap once in a while, could it?

…

"_Hold still, kid, and you might like this a little better." I struggled despite his words. One of them grabbed a handful of my hair and yanked, making me cry out in pain, and the rest of them laughed._

"_Please stop?" I begged. "Please, please just leave me alone..." My pleas, though, only fueled them on more, if anything, and I could feel their hands everywhere, touching me and tugging my clothes away from my body. I began to cry in fear and pain, as they continued to touch me. "Please, just stop! No..." Nothing I could say would deter them, I knew..._

"Malik! Malik, wake up! It's just a dream. Hey, Malik, look at me, please!" What was going on? I could only feel one pair of hands on me now, and they weren't hurting me. I opened my eyes and saw Marik's worried expression. That only made me cry harder, although this time, with relief. Realizing what had just happened, I let out a small sob, reaching for him. "Malik, it's okay..."

"No! No, no no..." Nothing was okay. Well, I was with him, but still... it wasn't okay. It wasn't, that is, until he took my pathetic, shaking form into his arms. I latched my arms around his neck, and I could feel him stiffen for a moment in surprise.

"Malik, it's okay. See? I've got you," He murmured, stroking my hair as I clung to him for dear life. When I felt him trying to move, I panicked a little.

"No! No, don't leave me!" Yeah, pathetic. I know.

"Shh, Malik. It's okay," He repeated for like the millionth time. "I'm not leaving you. Why would I do that?" As if on its own accord, my mouth opened, telling him exactly why he might want to do that.

"Because I'm pathetic and disgusting and needy and I can't fucking function on my own, and you're probably sick of dealing with me and my shit, and-" I was getting all worked up.

"Malik, breathe! Calm down, baby. Please, it's okay." Wait. What did he just call me? Did he call me baby? Really? That was okay with me... "Shhh... see? I'm not leaving you. I'm not going anywhere, and I'm not sick of you at all." He held me more tightly, and I realized exactly what position we were in. There we were, on the floor, me on top of him and his arms around me, holding me tightly. It did make me a little nervous, but I kept reminding myself that this was Marik. Nobody else. And that Marik didn't want to hurt me. "Yeah, it's okay, it's okay," He whispered over and over again, stroking my hair as he waited for my breathing to go back to normal. "No one's going to hurt you, Malik. I've got you and I won't let anyone else touch you. Ever." Strangely enough, I believed him. "And I'm not leaving you unless you want me to." I turned to him incredulously.

"Unless-unless I want you to? Why in the name of Ra would I want that?" He smiled.

"Hey, that's what I like to hear. I'm just saying that if you get sick of me, then nothing is stopping you from finding someone better." Wait... did that mean what I thought (hoped) it did?

"Are you saying that-that we- that we're like... together? You know what I mean?" I stammered, feeling my face blush. The expression of doubt on his face made me wish that I hadn't said anything, until I realized why he looked uncertain.

"Well, unless you don't want to- but I mean, we don't have to do anything. I mean, you're staying with me, but I mean, we can keep things completely platonic, if you want..." I think he was worried that I might get freaked out again, which was a reasonable concern, but I forced myself to stay calm.

"Um... that's okay with me... um, if you want to, I mean..." I come I always had to sound so fucking insecure? "I mean, um, us... like, together..." I buried my blushing face in his chest. "Gods, I sound retarded. Ignore me."

"No, I'm not going to ignore you!" He insisted, smiling at me. "I wouldn't mind that. I mean, like I said, we don't have to do anything you don't want to, or anything like that." He shifted a little, and I tightened my grip around his neck, laying my head on his chest. He awkwardly stroked my back, relaxing as he rubbed it soothingly.

"Thank you, Marik," I whispered. He kissed the top of my head, sending shivers throughout my entire body. They were nice shivers, though.

"Don't worry, Malik," He told me seriously as he held me against his body. I could feel his heart beating in his chest, and surprisingly, the close contact only made me feel a little uncomfortable. For the most part, I even enjoyed the closeness. There was no burning need to get away from him, to put distance between his body and mine. "Don't worry," He repeated, and I felt inclined to obey. "I'll take care of you, Malik. I'll keep you safe."

* * *

A/N: I've been slacking off so badly when it comes to fanfic, but I'm trying to be better about it. it seems like a lot of people do in the summer, though, for whatever reason. I haven't really been doing much but working, but you know...

thanks for reading and reviewing, as always. I really love hearing from everyone. and see? I said I would try to update sooner, and I did! I updated not that long ago! Okay sorry, I'm just proud of myself. :)

oh, my rat phoebe has a tumor on her side, and now I have to decide whether or not to get it removed. b/c she's over three years old, so she's getting kind of old, and unless it gets bigger, it won't really do anything bad, so... yeah. she's still as crazy as ever, though, so that's good. :)

let me know what you think of my chapter, and thanks for listening to my ramblings!

~alex~


	9. Chapter 9

~Chapter Nine~

* * *

(I own nothing)

* * *

Ryou had been getting very difficult to be around. He knew that something had happened, either between Marik and myself, or otherwise, and he was determined to find out. I decided that I would tell him just a little of what was going on, to hopefully get him off of my back for a while.

"So... Yeah."

"Wait. So... you and he are not only living together, but dating, as well?" I nodded, and he crossed his arms, sighing dramatically.

"What?" I asked, glaring back at him.

"Are you having sex?" Oh my gods, Ryou! What the hell?

"No! Not that it's any of your business." Where did he get the nerve to ask me that?

"Well, it's my business if I'm concerned about my friend." Ouch. Now I felt kinda bad for being so harsh on him before.

"I...I know," I sighed. "I'm sorry. Just... that's kind of personal, and I'm kind of uncomfortable talking about stuff like that..." I trailed off, hoping that he would drop it, but of course he didn't.

"Since when? You never have been before, and then all of a sudden, you blush at any mention of sex. What the hell happened, Malik?" Shiiiiiiit. When the fuck did Ryou get so damn perceptive? I didn't like this. He was looking at me all expectantly, waiting for me to just _tell _him everything, but I couldn't do that. No way in hell could I do that.

"Ryou-" I stopped. What exactly was I supposed to say? "Listen, Ryou. I know you want me to tell you what's going on, and I understand and appreciate your concern- I really do. I just... I can't talk about this to you right now, and I'm sorry, but... I can't. Please just trust me when I say that I am okay right now. Everything is okay with Marik, and he's taking care of me quite well." He scowled at me.

"Dammit, Malik... fine. But if I find any reason to think otherwise, then there will be hell to pay." He stared at me seriously as he spoke. I didn't doubt that he meant it completely, too.

"Thank you, Ryou," I told him sarcastically, "for protecting me. I'm sure you would be very good protection against most attackers." He laughed and shoved me.

"Hey! What the hell is that supposed to mean?" He demanded.

"That you're shorter than I am, and you weigh less than I do." He paused for a moment, thinking hard.

"Okay, fine. You got me there. But what I lack in size, I make up for in cunning and wit." I rolled my eyes, smiling, glad that the focus of the conversation had been diverted- for the moment, anyway.

* * *

"So what are you going to tell him?" Marik asked me as he navigated the busy street. I sighed.

"I don't know." That's the problem right now. I don't want to tell him... everything," I stammered, "but on the other hand, he's gonna figure out if I keep lying to him." He shrugged.

"Well, it's not really his business. I mean, if you don't want to tell him, you don't have to tell him shit." Hm. He had a point there, but still...

"I... I guess. But I feel bad keeping things from him..."

"Then tell him!" Marik exclaimed, clearly frustrated. "I don't care what you tell him!" I didn't say anything. I wasn't sure if he was actually angry with me. "Malik?" He said tentatively, glancing at me sideways.

"What?"

"Are you okay?" I shrugged, not looking at him.

"Am I annoying you?"

"No! Well, maybe just a little, because you're so damn worried, but no. You do not annoy me." I smiled at him, a little happier. I'd been worried lately about being a burden to Marik, so any little reassurance that I was not bothering him was greatly appreciated. "So. Not to change the subject or anything, but what do you want to do now that we're out of class?" I shrugged.

"I dunno. Whatever you want to do." There wasn't a whole hell of a lot to do around here...

"I was thinking we could get something to eat, if you wanted."

"Sure, sure. Sounds good to me." I was a little hungry, now that he mentioned it.

"Do you have any preference where?" I shook my head. We went to a smallish restaurant that served mainly different kinds of pasta.

"This is really good; thank you." Marik shrugged, a little sheepishly. Suddenly, I froze, a harsh voice reaching my ears.

"Malik? Malik, what's wrong?" I didn't respond, my heart racing almost as quickly as my thoughts. I knew that laugh... I _knew _that laugh. "Malik! What's going on?" Marik's expression held concern, and I knew I must look terrified.

"I... that guy. I know him..."

"The loud one that keeps laughing really obnoxiously?" I nodded. "I'm sorry. From where?" I closed my eyes, breathing in deeply.

"From... from the other night." Marik's playful expression sobered immediately.

"As in...?" I nodded again, and I swear, the change in his face was instantaneous and terrifying. Now, Marik can be sort of intimidating. He's pretty built, and from what I've seen, he can move very quickly when he wants to. The look that he was sending in the direction of the large man was enough to make even the bravest of men think twice about messing with him, although apparently the man hadn't noticed yet, as he was still laughing loudly about whatever it was his companion had to say. "What about the other one? Does he look familiar?" Oh, I didn't want to have to look at them... not any more than was absolutely necessary. I glanced up quickly, scanning the room until my eyes landed on the man I was looking for. I shuddered involuntarily, nodding. Yes, the other man had been there as well. Marik's expression darkened even more, and he started to stand up. I grabbed at his sleeve, panicking.

"No, Marik! What are you going to do? Please, not here." He hesitated, looking torn between listening to me and beating the shit out of the two men. Despite myself, I couldn't help feeling a little swell of joy that he wanted to protect me that much. "Just don't do anything right now," I pleaded as he glanced in their direction again, clearly thinking. He nodded once.

"Fine. But I'm texting Bakura." What would that achieve? "I'm telling him that two of the scumbuckets that hurt you are here... and that he should get over here so he can follow them." Wait, what?

"Why would you want him to follow them?"

"So that you know who they are, of course. So that you know where they live, so that you can send them death threats, or burn their house down or something like that." Okay, the first one, maybe, but...

"I'm not burning down anyone's house, I hate to disappoint you." He shrugged, smirking as he hit the 'send' button.

"Yeah, we'll see about that, now won't we?" I wasn't really sure what to say to that, so I remained silent.

Bakura must have been pretty eager to get down to business, because he was there within ten minutes, waving away a flustered waitress as she tried to tell him that he had to at least buy a drink. "He'll have a large Mountain Dew, please," Marik told her, rolling his eyes at his friend. She nodded, hurrying away. "You're a jerk, you know that?" Bakura grinned, again showing the majority of his teeth.

"Yeah, but that's why you like me. How's it goin', Malik?" I smiled weakly.

"Fine..." My gaze flickered involuntarily to the two men, both of whom were still laughing and eating and making me feel uncomfortable. Bakura's eyes followed mine, and his expression, just like Marik's before, turned dark and foreboding.

"Are those the bastards?" He hissed. I nodded, and he smiled again, this time with no trace of his usual good humor. He pulled out a cell phone, much better than even the one that Marik's father had bought him, and began typing away furiously.

"What are you doing?" Marik asked.

"I'll fill you in later. You guys are about done eating, right?" He gestured to our empty plates. "Why don't you take Malik somewhere else, and I'll sit here and wait for them to leave." This sounded like it could be a dangerous idea.

"Okay, but what happens after they leave? What are you going to do?" He winked at me.

"Don't worry about it, kid. I'm not gonna kill them, although I should. It's not like they don't deserve worse." A pleasant smile crossed his face, and he looked content to imagine different tortures and punishments for the perpetrators.

"Well, Bakura, whatever you do, be careful. Don't do anything too stupid this time."

"I'm not promising anything," he warned Marik as we walked away from the table, towards the exit. Unfortunately, we had to walk right the fuck past their table in order to get out, and as we passed, I caught a whiff of a familiar, sickening smell. The mixture of cologne, sweat, tobacco, alcohol, and general filth that I had smelled that night. I froze for just a moment, but it was enough to get them to look at me. I froze completely under their gazes. They didn't seem to recognize me, somehow. They didn't even try to hide their interest as their eyes swept my figure, up and down, examining me.

"Malik... come on, Malik." Marik was whispering to me, prodding me in the back with his finger. I forced myself to walk forward, even though I felt like I was being held into place by some sort of force. "You okay?" I nodded, my heart pounding. And surprisingly, I was okay. Instead of feeling afraid of them, I felt exhilarated that I had been that close to them and that they hadn't recognized me. Plus, Bakura was going to "take care" of them for me. Things were looking up!

* * *

A/N: Sorry if this chapter is a little weird in anything like wording; it's 6:04 in the morning, and I've yet to go to bed. also sorry that it took me so long to update. I wasn't planning on working quite this much during the summer, so I don't have as much free time as I had originally planned.

ummm... review, please, just to let me know what you think, but please don't insult it because you don't like the way things are going.

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

~alex~


	10. Chapter 10

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Ten~

* * *

"So you know that cashier in there? The girl?" I tried to remember what she had looked like.

"The one with the really long white hair?" Marik nodded.

"That was Bakura's cousin, Kisara." Was there anyone that Bakura didn't have ties to, in one way or another?

"She seemed nice..."

"Yeah, she's a sweet kid. Gets her in trouble sometimes, although Bakura's really protective of her, so people don't try to mess with her any more." I wondered what he meant by that, but he didn't volunteer any more information on the subject, so I didn't press the matter. "If they used a credit card or anything to pay, she can get their info. I'm guessing that Bakura hit her up to get their names." That made sense. "So see? He's got this under control. Don't be worried."

"I'm not worried!" I protested, although I was a little concerned. Marik rolled his eyes, clearly not believing me.

"You know where I met Bakura?" I shook my head. "On the streets of Cairo. Trust me, he can hold his own in a fight."

A moment later, we heard the faint siren of an ambulance grow louder until it passed right by us. I watched it hurrying by, vaguely concerned. Marik chuckled darkly. I turned to him, puzzled. He shrugged at me. "What can I say? My man moves fast." Wait... he couldn't mean...?

"What did he do to them?" I shrieked, starting to panic.

"No, calm down! Nothing too serious, I promise. He doesn't kill/maim people, he just fucks them up for a while. And he makes sure they won't ever want to do anything like that to anyone ever again." Well... that was good, I guess. Right? I mean... they were obviously not good people. The more I thought about it, the more I was convinced that I was right... but I still felt a little guilty. I guess Marik could tell it was bothering me, because he put his arm around my waist, hugging me close to him and nuzzling my hair. It earned us a couple of catcalls, as well as a disapproving voice- which was met with hostility from the others. I could feel my cheeks burning red.

"Malik? What is going on here?" I felt my stomach drop as I heard someone I really didn't want to hear. I took a deep breath, and turned to face my less-than-accepting brother-in-law, Patrick.

"Patrick, this is my boyfriend, Marik. Marik, this is my sister's fiance, Patrick. Good to see you, Patrick." I turned to walk away, but that ass was having none of that.

"How could you be so selfish?" I stopped dead in my tracks, spinning to face him.

"Excuse me?" My voice was cold, and Marik shifted uncomfortably next to me.

"After everything your sister has done for you, how could you do this to her?"

"You say that _I'm _selfish?" I asked incredulously. He couldn't be serious, could he? "You come in, start dating my sister, my only surviving family, knock her up, pretty much kick me out, and I just go along with it, and you say that _I'm _selfish? Well fuck you, Patrick." He looked a little taken aback, but persisted (most likely out of sheer dumb pride).

"You know what I mean."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Was he retarded?

"She's pregnant. How do you think hearing about _this_ would be for her health, and the baby's health?" I glared at him.

"Well, since my sister is a reasonable human being, she would probably be a little surprised, but she'd understand and accept it." He laughed, scornful.

"You're as you say, her 'only living family.' She'd never have any real nieces or nephews. I know she's a pretty traditional family type person. This would put unnecessary strain on her. How dare you endanger her health?" Okay, I was going to kill this guy.

"Excuse me," Marik said in his most sophisticated, polite voice. "We really mean no harm to anyone. If it would be better, we wouldn't have to tell her right away." Patrick looked ready to protest, but Marik cleared his throat, effectively interrupting him. "How about this. Give me a month. I'll meet Isis, as Marik's friend and roommate. Get to know me, let her make her own judgement on me. If she doesn't like me, I'll leave you and your family alone forever. But if she decides that I'm alright, then I get to stick around." Patrick thought about it for a moment, and I almost thought he was going to refuse.

"All right. I'll expect you to our house tonight at six pm sharp for dinner." Without waiting for a response, he stalked away, clearly angry about the way things had gone.

"Well. He's a piece of work, isn't he?" Marik observed.

* * *

And so the date was set for that night, then, for Marik to meet my sister and to have dinner with us. I was sort of freaking out. Damn that Patrick! There was a reason I didn't like him: he was a total jerk. Although I was a nervous wreck, Marik was calm and collected, as always.

"Malik, love, calm down! She isn't even going to know that we're dating. You'll see."

"But what if Patrick does tell her? You know how he is."

"He is a huge tool, but he wouldn't tell her something that he thinks is going to shock her, just in case it's bad for either her or the baby. He'll wait until she says something about how she doesn't like me to tell her."

"But she will like you," I protested.

"Well, of course she will. Women love me. But that's not what Patrick thinks, you know? He's counting on her hating me. He's probably mentioned some 'rumors he's heard,' or something of the sort." Well, that was for sure, if I knew Patrick at all.

"So what are you going to do?" He laughed, putting his arm around my shoulders.

"Don't worry about it, babe. I got this."

* * *

"Marik, are you sure about that outfit?" I asked hesitantly.

"What's wrong with my outfit?" He responded, frowning, as he straightened his jacket.

"Well... it looks a bit... gay," I admitted. I was even playing it down, too. He was wearing what looked to be extremely expensive jeans with a plain white t-shirt and a tight, purple pinstriped jacket, accompanied by purple boots. He had gold jewelery that was, admittedly, very appropriate, as it was all very Egyptian-themed, but didn't do anything to reinforce the "straight" look.

"No," he corrected me, looking slightly offended. "I'm exotic. I thought you'd like it." He looked like he was going to start pouting if I didn't act fast, and that was all I needed at the moment.

"I never said that I didn't like it," I told him sincerely. "I just said that you looked gay."

"Listen, kiddo. Trust me on this. Okay? I got it all under control." Although I was reluctant, I finally nodded, realizing that I didn't really have any other choice but to trust him. After all, he hadn't let me down yet.

* * *

"So, Marik, do you have a job or anything?" Patrick asked smugly, as if knowing the answer already.

"Not at the moment," Marik told him. "I was employed at the local bank for a few years as branch manager, but I decided to resign in order to focus more diligently on my studies." Patrick did not appear to be pleased as Isis voiced her appreciation of his dedication and talent. All night, Patrick had been doing his best to make Marik look bad, and all night, Marik had skillfully turned every single opportunity to his advantage. He had been right about Isis liking him; she was soon discussing baby names with him, and he was easily discussing the latest trends in Egyptian names. All in all, they were getting along wondrously. So much so that by the end of the night, Patrick was looking totally defeated. He knew that he'd lost. After dinner, Isis and I washed dishes, and Patrick awkwardly made conversation with Marik in the living room. We'd kicked them out of the tiny kitchen in order to have room to move.

"So," she said as she scrubbed at a stubborn bit of food.

"So?" I prompted her when she didn't continue.

"So he seems really nice," she said, glancing at me from the corner of her kohl-rimmed eye. I nodded in agreement. It was a fact, after all. "And you seem to be really happy." She smiled warmly at me, and just like that, I knew I had my sister's approval. I smiled a silent thanks at her as we finished drying the dishes and went to join our significant others. They glanced at Isis and me in surprise when I put my hand in Marik's, right there in front of my sister. When she acted as if nothing was amiss, Patricks shoulders slumped ever-so-slightly, Marik grinning happily.

As Isis hugged me goodbye for the night, she cupped her hand around my ear, whispering to me.

"Ignore Patrick."

* * *

A/N: okay, you have permission to hate me with how long it's been between updates. I am very very sorry... but I still love you all. :D

I hope you liked this chapter. I had some slight difficulty, b/c I wrote chapter ten without rereading chapter nine, and then even though ten was awesome, it totally contradicted chapter nine. so I had to rewrite it. you know how it goes...

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

I started a Mighty Boosh fiction as well, even though I already have enough of them to work on... I had to, though. Mighty Boosh is possibly the best show in the world (especially if you're high), so you should go watch it. :D

let me know what you think! I was pretty pleased with this chapter, all in all. I like this story. woohoo! chapter ten, and no end in sight!

~alex~


	11. Chapter 11

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Eleven~

* * *

"Well, that wasn't a complete disaster..." I mused to Marik once we were back at his house. "Isis knows what's up, and she seems to approve, so that's a huge relief."

"As if she wouldn't approve. She's really sweet. I like her a lot." I rolled my eyes.

"And you're completely flaming. Listen to yourself right now." He stuck his long tongue out at me (not to change topics, but he has the longest tongue ever! Seriously, that thing is huge! I know, I know. That's what she said. Ha ha, funny).

"Oh, hush. It's not like you mind. All your friends are flaming, too, from what I've seen of them."

"Well, that may be," I admitted, feeling a little guilty, "but they're not even out to me, so don't say anything to anyone."

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. It's weird about Patrick, though," he said, jumping back to our previous subject. "He's such a massive dick- not that he has one- but he really is good for your sister."

"I know!" I sighed, exasperated. "That's what pisses me off the most. Because he's such a jerk to me, but I can't hate him, because he's so good to Isis.

"Nah, you can hate him. He's mean to you. So what's on your agenda for tomorrow?"

"Not much, I guess... what's up with you?" He looked mildly uncomfortable.

"Well... my parents are visiting, and my mom wanted to come see the house and see how I'm holding up. So I'll probably go grocery shopping in a bit, so there's some food in the house tomorrow when she comes, and then do some tidying up. You need anything from the store?" I scratched my head, trying to think.

"Not really... shouldn't you invite your mom to stay for dinner, though?" He groaned.

"Shit. I didn't even think of that... she'll probably expect it, too, and I can't fucking cook. I'm fucked."

"Well," I suggested timidly. "What does your mom like to eat? I can maybe cook something..." He stared at me in wonder.

"What? You can cook?" I nodded, not offended that he sounded so amazed. "Marry me, Malik. Shit... I dunno. What can you cook?" I ran through the options in my mind.

"W-well... your family is from Egypt, right?" I stammered, my cheeks red. "Does she like Egyptian food?" Marik nodded, his eyes lighting up.

"Yeah, actually. She really likes Egyptian food, but she can't cook worth shit either."

"Well, then how about a nice grilled chicken and rice dish? Does that sound okay?" He nodded.

"Yeah, she'd love that... you're a lifesaver, babe. Make a list of what you need, okay? I'll get ready and leave in a few minutes. Unless you wanted to come, too?" I shook my head, my blush deepening at his praise. I was pretty worn out from the rest of the day.

"You should probably call her and actually ask her to stay for dinner, just so she knows."

"You're so smart... I'll be back soon. Call me if you need anything." he kissed the top of my head sweetly, and I smiled back at him. As soon as he was out the door, I began tidying up. I wanted to help as much as I could- not that I was concerned about impressing his mother, either. After a few minutes, I heard a knock at the door. "Did you miss me?" I called, puzzled when I didn't hear a smart remark back. "Marik? Did you forget something?"

"M-Malik? Is that you?" Came a muffled but familiar voice.

"Bakura?" I opened the door, horrified by what I saw. "Dear Ra, what the _**hell**_ happened to you?" I helped a bloodied Bakura stumble into the apartment. "I'll call an ambulance." I reached for the phone, but he shook his head.

"No, don't call anyone. I don't want the police to get involved in this."

"But you're bleeding all over the place!" I protested- as if he didn't already know this. "What the fuck _happened_?" I demanded. He opened his mouth to reply, but ended up just coughing up blood. "**Fuck**!" Not that I was freaking out, or anything. "I'm calling Marik." He nodded, clutching at his stomach. I dialed Marik's number, but it went straight to the voicemail. "Fuuuuck!" I rushed into the bathroom, bringing out an armful of towels. "Here, lay down or something." I spread them on the sofa, but Bakura shook his head.

"No, put them in the bathroom. I'll bleed through the towels; don't wanna get Marik's couch all bloody." He sat down on the floor in the bathroom. I dialed Marik's number again. This time, it rang, but then went to voicemail.

"Shit, Bakura! He's not answering! What do I do?" I was panicking. He coughed, wincing in agony and clutching at his abdomen, where blood was steadily oozing from a wound that I couldn't see. "Ra, what happened?"

"J-just a s-squabble," he rasped, his voice hoarse. "Don' wanna talk about it n-now... towel?"

"Well what should we do? You're going to bleed to death!" I told him, handing him a clean towel for him to press against the wound.

"D-do you have... access to a-a car?" He closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall, a trickle of blood running from the side of his mouth to his chin.

"No-maybe!" I remembered Ryou's car at the last second.

"See if you c-can get it... t-there's a doctor I know-" he broke off, coughing and wincing again. I was already dialing Ryou's number. He picked up on the third ring.

"Hel-"

"Ryou, I need your help," I blurted, interrupting him.

"What did Marik do? Did he hurt you?" He demanded, venom in his voice.

"No, just... I don't have time to explain, I need you to get here now."

"Okay, okay. Where is it?" I gave him the address (to enter into his GPS). "Okay, according to this, I'll be there in six minutes. You're lucky I'm so close."

"Thank you so much, Ryou. I'll make it up to you, I swear." I turned to Bakura, who was breathing heavily, his bloodstained teeth clenched in pain. "He's on his way, just hold on a little longer, okay?" He nodded. I tried to call Marik four more times, but he must have been in a bad area for reception, because it kept going straight to the voicemail.

"M-Malik," Bakura whispered hoarsely. "Go t-take down..." he gasped in pain. "...the shower curtain. Otherwise... I'll g-get blood in your friend's car..." I couldn't believe that even in this state, he was still worried about something like that. He had a point, though, so I did as he asked. "Besides," he added, smirking. "If I don't make it, you'll need something to wrap the body in."

"Bakura!" I shrieked, horrified. "That's not even funny!"

"I'm s-serious. Either I'm gonna d-die, or I'm not. No sense in pretending... that it c-can't happen." Okay, he had a point, but still! "Hand me the phone." I did as he said. "Hey, M-Marik, it's Bakura." He broke off coughing. "I'm at your house, a-and I'm k-kinda dying... Malik and his friend are taking me to 'that' doctor. So I'll hopefully s-see you later..." He hung up and turned to me.

"How can you be so calm about that?"

"Like I said, it might happen, it might not. Nothing we can really do about it, is there?"

"Well, no, but... No, you're _not_ going to die!" Something horrible occurred to me. "Oh gods, Bakura... you didn't get hurt from something that had to do with me... did you?"

"Malik... don't worry about it. I-I'm not going t-to talk about it now..."

"Bakura, don't die because of me! _Please_!" I could feel the tears streaming down my face. Too many people had been hurt because of me...

"Besides, I have to be calm about it, if I don't want to die. If I get all upset, it will make my heart rate go up, and I'll bleed out more quickly. Just trust me on it." It sounded like this wasn't the first time he'd had to deal with something like this.

"Well yeah, but-" Just then, there came a loud honking from outside.

"Thank the gods! Help me out there." I supported Bakura, helping him stumble to the minivan.

"Shit, Malik! What the fuck happened to him?" Ryou demanded as Bakura painstakingly lay the shower curtain out on the car seat.

"Hell if I know; I've been trying to figure that out myself. He says it was a 'scuffle.'" Ryou rolled his eyes.

"Oh, yeah. That explains _everything._" Bakura turned his attention to Ryou.

"Well, h-hello there, gorgeous," he rasped, wiping another drip of blood from his chin. "What's your name?" As expected, Ryou's pale skin flushed bright red.

"Um... I'm Ryou..." He seemed at a loss for words, which I knew meant that he found Bakura attractive, too.

"I'm Bakura. Well, n-now that I've seen you... I feel a little less inclined to die..." He said, with what sounded like a cross between a laugh and a horrible cough. "L-let's get going, yeah?"

* * *

A/N: Oh, the suspense! I know, I'm a very mean person... don't worry, though. you won't have to wait _too_ long to find out what happens... I've got most of this chapter already written, even if it's not typed. :)

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

my rat, Ren, died... it was really sad. I was holding her when she died... she got sick, and I took her to the vet (twice in two days- talk about a hefty vet bill), and they gave her antibiotic shots and medicine, but... it didn't help. Poor Raissa (one of my others) kept looking for her... :'( I got a baby rat, though, and I named her Mei (like in "My Neighbor Totoro!), and she's really cute. she loves Lacey (my cat) and my other rats, Raissa and especially Phoebe (although I think Phoebe has another tumor... gotta get that checked out too). I love my rats. :)

let me know what you think. :) reviews make me HAPPY.

~alex~


	12. Chapter 12

(I own nothing)

* * *

Chapter Twelve

* * *

Bakura gave us directions (he didn't have an exact address), but I couldn't help notice the way his voice seemed to get fainter and fainter as he lost more and more blood.

"Here," he whispered, pointing shakily at a very rundown building.

"Here?" I asked incredulously, as Ryou and I helped him out of the car. "This is the doctor's place?"

"Yeah," he grunted, teeth clenched in absolute agony. "Get me over there." He gestured weakly toward the front door. We helped him walk over there (I noticed that he seemed to be leaning more heavily on Ryou than me... gee, I wonder why), and he rang the doorbell- about six times. A moment later, a thin, long-haired man came to the door.

"Bakura, darling." Ryou bristled slightly. "Whatever have I done to deserve a visit from myou?"

"Shut it, Pegasus," Bakura growled. "Help me." Pegasus shook his head, smiling.

"Not so fast, Bakura boy. You still owe me from last time." Bakura clenched his teeth, although whether in anger or pain, I couldn't tell.

"Don't be a dick... I'm dying. Can't pay you if I'm dead."

"But how can I be sure you'll pay me?"

"Please just treat him," Ryou implored, surprising everyone in the room. "We can work out payment later..." Pegasus's eyes lit up, examining him from head to toe.

"Oh? You're willing to pay for him?" Despite his weakened state, Bakura managed to snarl fiercely at the other white-haired man.

"Don't you fucking touch him, Pegasus!" He hissed.

"A pity..." He turned his cold eyes to me in interest. "What about you? You're beautiful, too..." Oh, fuck. That had better not be what he meant by payment.

"Stay the fuck away from him, too. You don't want ot be on Marik's bad side, do you?"

"Oh, Marik's new plaything?"

"His boyfriend," Bakura corrected him. "Just don't fuck with either of them." He coughed, spraying blood across the floor.

"Alright! I didn't realize you were in quite such bad shape. This will cost you extra, you know. You two can just sit over there... there are magazines and such. Hopefully this ingrate doesn't die on us." He hauled Bakura (rather roughly) into the other room, the door closing loudly behind him.

"Wow, really?" Ryou muttered in disgust upon realizing that all of the magazines on the table were x-rated in nature. "Malik," he called, turning to me seriously, and I knew that I wasn't going to like this conversation. "We have to talk."

"Yeah, I know..." I buried my face in my hands. "Shit, Ryou. I think he got hurt because of me..." I explained (more or less) what had happened to me. "And so Bakura was going to go fuck up those guys who hurt me, and I think he got hurt from one of those guys."

"Goddammit, Malik..." He seemed to be thinking. "That's pretty intense. Are you doing okay now? Aside from Bakura being all fucked up." That's what I liked about Ryou. He was straight to the point, and didn't waste time on sympathies that he knew were pointless and wouldn't help. I nodded. "Good. Now, what are we going to do about Bakura? Assuming he makes it."

"Well... what do you mean?"

"You heard that Pegasus doctor. You're not stupid; I know you know what he meant by payment." Oh, yes, that.

"Well, you can't have you're new boyfriend in that position," (no pun intended) "so we'd better figure something out pretty quickly." His expression was priceless.

"Excuse me? Who's the one with the boyfriend?" He snapped back.

"Hey, don't get all defensive. I was just saying, because he got all protective of you with Pegasus-"

"And of you!"

"I'm his best friend's boyfriend, plus he knows about my recent 'trauma.' when I first met him, he made a joke about Marik sharing me, and at the time, it freaked me out pretty badly. He felt really bad about it after he knew... he's a nice guy." So I was building him up a little to Ryou... I owed it to him. Ryou looked worried, and I was reminded by how bad of shape Bakura was in. "He'll be okay,"I reassured Ryou, sounding a little like Marik had earlier today... hopefully, this time he really would be okay. As if on cue, the door to the other room opened to a disturbing sight- Pegasus, more or less covered in blood, wiping his hands on a towel.

"Well, he'll be okay," he told us, smirking as if quite self-satisfied. Although I guess if he was a good enough doctor, he was entitled to be smug. The relief that washed through the room was almost palpable.

"Thank you so much..." I told him.

"You're welcome. However, there is still the issue of payment." of course.

"Can't we wait for him to get better?" I snapped.

"Well, that's what was agreed upon last time, and it never happened. So I need something a little more concrete. Unless, like I said, either of you want to pay in his stead. I woiuld be more than happy to work with you." I recoiled in disgust, a slightly panicked feeling rising in my chest.

"Pegasus!" Came Bakura's voice, hoarse and decidedly unhealthy sounding, from the next room. "I told you not to fucking touch them!"

"And I told you not to move! You need to rest!" He snapped back. "How the hell are you even conscious? I gave you double the amount of the sedative as last time."

"Yeah, well... I need more than that," Bakura concluded, sounding a little out of it- but not like he'd had a double dosage of sedative.

"If I give you any more right now, it might kill you. You've had a near-lethal dosage as it is. What in God's name are you doing! Get back in that bed!"

"Hell no, I've heard that from you before."

"Fine, kill yourself. See if I care."

"Where are the meds to take with me?" He demanded, tottering into the room. His eyes were slightly unfocused, and around his (topless) abdomen, he wore a thick bandage.

"Be patient, dear," Pegasus instructed, pulling a key from one of his pockets. "I'll be back in a moment." He came back holding three large (but unmarked) pill bottles. "Okay. This one's an antibiotic. Take it once a day. This is for pain. I would say not to take more than three in a day, but knowing you, you could take the whole thing without dying. That _**doesn't**_ mean that you should, though," he emphasized, glaring at Bakura. "I won't be responsible if you get yourself killed. You two. I'm not sure which of you will be in charge of this, but if he tries to pull any more of this shit- getting out of bed **ten fucking minutes** after surgery- or not staying in bed, as it may be- make him take two or three of these. Normally it's just one, though, so if you're going to use them recreationally, take one maximum. Especially since you two are so small. This freak is just oddly resistant to any form of medication. Got it?" Ryou and I nodded, as Bakura sort of swayed in spot. We just wanted to get out of there. "You, Marik's boyfriend. Give me your cell number." I did, but when he dialed it from his phone, he got an error message. "Is it on?" he asked.

"Of course... Oh, shit. I have no service. What if Marik tried to call?" The second I walked to the other side of the room (which magically had service), it began vibrating, indicating the seven text messages and three voicemails from Marik. "Shit." I dialed his phone.

"Malik, where the fuck are you and what's going on?" he answered, sounding frantic. "Are you okay? Is Bakura okay?"

"Yeah, Bakura was hurt, so we wen't to this doctor's place- he's okay now, but we don't have any way to pay him, since he won't trust Bakura to actually pay him, as he skipped out on him last time." He swore under his breath.

"Don't eat or drink anything he gives you; give me ten minutes." He hung up, and I just stared at the phone, not entirely sure what was going on.

"Did you talk to Marik?" Pegasus asked, walking up behind me and standing just a little too close for comfort.

"Yeah," I said, backing away nervously. "He said to give him ten minutes, but I'm not suere what he meant by that."

"You know," Pegasus whispered, leaning closer to me and all but making my skin crawl. "We could do a lot of things in ten minutes..." although I'd been calm up until now, I couldn't stop myself from flinching backward, nor could I silence the muffled whimper that escaped. Pegasus looked slightly curious. "You know... your reactions are awfully extreme for the situation. Obviously, since I'm still trying to convince you, I'm not intending on forcing you. And your irrational fear of such proximity makes me wonder... what about touch?" As he spoke, he reached up and pushed a lock of hair out of my face, brushing my cheek in the process. I had to bite back a sob, my eyes clenched painfully tight, as if trying to make him disappear. He said that he wouldnt force me, but still... "And besides. Bakura and your friend are right over there." He pointed, and I saw Ryou trying to help Bakura up off of the floor, where he had decided to lay down. "Even injured badly and drugged, I'm not foolish enough to provoke him. And Marik is a force to be reckoned with, too. I do have to know, though... was it Marik?" I looked at him, not sure what he was asking.

"What?"

"The one who raped you... Did Marik rape you?" My eyes widened, and I shook my head forcefully.

"No! No... he helped me. Is still helping me. And Bakura..." I took a deep breath. "He got hurt helpoing me, too. I think. He followed them home, and I don't know what he did to them, but he got hurt somehow, and it's my fault-"

"When you say 'them,'" he interrupted, although not altogether rudely (I was starting to panic and ramble), "How many do you mean?" Oh, Gods! I couldn't believe that this man would be asking me this! "I'm only curious," he said, his voice a little more gentle, "from the view of a doctor. Purely professional." Oh... I guess he was a doctor after all... I swallowed heavily.

"F-five," I whispered, lowering my head in shame. I couldn't help it; I was embarrassed. He made a small tsking noise, and at first I thought- for a brief, horrible second- that he was laughing at me. Until I looked at him and saw the furious expression on his face.

"That's disgusting," he spat. "I hope Bakura at least did a decent job on them." I was shocked at his anger, but felt a little better about him and the whole situation.

"Well, they needed an ambulance," I told him. He smirked back at me.

"That's our boy..." a harsh knock on the door accomanied four rings of the doorbell, and Pegasus sighed. "That will be your boyfriend." Ryou was now sitting on the sofa, a sedated Bakura leaning (heavily) against him. He watched me carefully as I walked across the room with Pegasus, and I nodded to let him know that I was okay. He relaxed, but still kept a wary eye on the doctor, who checked the peephole and then let Marik in. "Welcome, Marik-boy. Oh, relax," he commanded when Marik opened his mouth, to shout or something. "Your friend is fine, as are your boyfriend and his equally pretty friend here." Ryou and I blushed, and Bakura giggled, agreeing with the 'pretty.' Marik gave me the same look that Ryou had just given me, and again I nodded reassurance.

"Then I thank you, very much." He bowed his head toward him. "Will you accept monetary or material payment?" Pegasus was silent for a moment, but then shook his head.

"No. However," he said, his smile crafty. "You don't need to worry about it. Let's just call it even for now." he turned to rifle through some paperwork, pulling out a sheet of paper, upon which he wrote all of the instructions he had told Ryou and me for the medicine and giving it to Marik. "I've already told them what to do, but take this just in case. Now, if you'll excuse me and get him out of here." he gestured to Bakura, who now had his head in Ryou's lap, "I have some business to which I must attend." Marik gaped at him, but didn't question the motives behind the doctor's generosity.

"Thank you, Pegasus," I told him as Marik helped Bakura to his feet. Pegasus actually smiled at me (as opposed to smirking), but said nothing.

"Well," he said, as he saw us out the door. "I hope we can meet under different circumstances. Until then, goodbye. Oh, and don't get fucking stabbed in the gut, like him." We bade him goodbye, and then lay Bakura in the back of the minivan, buckling him in securely and telling him (much like a dog) to stay. I rode with Marik and explained to him what I knew about what had happened and that Pegasus knew that I had been raped.

"Oh, that makes sense..." he mused.

"It does?"

"Yeah... I have known Pegasus for a while... he actually isn't that much older than we are. Five years or so... anyway, ever since he was like, six, his parents have been addicted to coke. His dad eventually overdosed, and then his mom lost her job. So she sorta became a crack whore. Sometimes, she would arrange for him to be home alone, and then she would give the housekeys to one-or more- clients." He didn't explain any further, but he didn't need to. "He always helps people, but holds them to it eventually, and he never does anything for free. And he's a creeper, although he makes up for it by being a good doctor." Which reminded me...

"Marik? I think he got hurt because of those guys." he frowned. "I told you I don't want anyone to get hurt for me." He sighed.

"Malik. Do you know just how much shady stuff Bakura gets up to daily? Maybe it was those guys, but maybe not." Not too reassuring, but better than no consolation at all.

"Well what are we going to do about him?"

"I'm not sure where he's staying currently, so I guess he'll have to stay here until he's coherent. Plus we should probably keep an eye on him. His biggest problem is that he won't stay resting, and then he gets worse. Well, he gets better eventually, but you know."

"What about your mom visiting?"

"Don't worry. I called and told her that he was in an accident, so she's not coming till next week." We pulled up to the house, and helped Ryou unload Bakura.

"Night, R'yo," he muttered, smiling at my friend who turned bright red.

"Good night, Bakura. Get better soon."

"Ryou, thank you. If you hadn't driven him, he would have died," Marik thanked him earnestly.

"Oh, y-your welcome... bye, Malik."

"See you, Ryou. I'll call you tomorrow?"

"Please do." once he left, Marik put his arms around me, hugging me tightly.

"Fuck... I'm going to bed," He muttered, yawning, and puling me gently along with him. I realized what a crazy day it had been, and nodded in agreement, joining him in bed.

* * *

A/N: Hey, everyone! so I know this one doesn't even mention him, but I wanted to say happy birthday to Seto Kaiba! I wore my Yu-Gi-Oh shirt to school today without even realizing that it was his birthday. :)

I absolutely love Bakura, and I love writing him. Not that I don't love everyone else, but he keeps things interesting.

Thanks for reading it; just let me know what you think, and I'll love you forever!

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*

~alex~


	13. Chapter 13

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Thirteen~

* * *

The next day, although I'd planned on sleeping in, started earlier than I would have liked. I awoke to my phone vibrating its way obnoxiously off of my night stand, landing next to my head, where it knew I _had _to answer it. I flipped it open, not even checking the display.

"Mh'lo?" I mumbled.

"Good morning to you too, Malik."

"Wadya want, Ryou?" I managed, yawning hugely.

"Is Bakura doing okay?" He asked quickly.

"Fuck if I know! 'M still in bed!" I dragged myself out of bed, rubbing my eyes as they struggled to adjust to the sudden brightness of eight in the morning. "I'm checkin'." I shuffled into the other room, where Bakura was still sprawled on the couch, in almost the exact position as I'd last seen him. "Bakura, you alive?"

"Ehhh?" He opened his eyes, and turned to look at/through me. "Ay, Malik! Buddy! How ya doin'?"

"Yeah, he's fine," I reported to Ryou. "Still pretty drugged up." Which reminded me... I shuffled back into the other room, finding the correct dosage of the pills I was supposed to give him. "Here," I said, shoving them towards him. "I'll get you some water; do you like cereal? You shouldn't have pills on an empty stomach."

"I like... _erything._" He declared, closing his eyes again.

"Well, there you have it, Ryou. He's doing well, and he likes, quote, 'erything.'" Bakura's eyes snapped back open.

"Ryou? Where?" He asked frantically, looking around for my friend.

"He's on the phone, Bakura," I explained, pointing to my phone. His expression dropped, so much that even I felt sad. "Ryou, what are you doing today?"

"Nothing," he answered quickly. "Why?" I walked into the other room so that Bakura couldn't hear me. "Want to come over? Bakura really wants to see you; I think it would help him a lot," I said, sounding as sincere as I possibly could.

"Oh, um, well, I guess I could stop by, if you really think it would, um, help." I grinned at the nervous squeak in his voice (I'm a little evil).

"Definitely. See you in a little bit, then? Do you know about what time?"

"Um, well, I'm heading out... anyway, and so I could just come over when I'm done at... the store." Ryou was lying, although I wasn't sure about what. Knowing him, he was out, driving around, waiting until he had deemed it late enough to call on a Saturday and still have it be acceptable.

"Alright, see you then." I plugged my phone back in, careful not to wake Marik (who had managed to sprawl across the ENTIRE bed in the last few minutes). Alright, time to get some food for Bakura. I opened the cupboard and stared at it blankly for a few seconds, before I even began processing what was in there. "Cheerios." I pulled out the big yellow box and poured a large bowl for Bakura. I then brought that, the box, and the milk, as well as a glass of water and a glass of orange juice into the living room on a tray, which I sat on the table. "Bakura!" He opened his eyes.

"Wat."

"Breakfast."

"Thangs."

"No problem." We sat there, him eating his breakfast (with only a little difficulty), and me staring blankly into space. He took his pills, and then as I was cleaning up, the doorbell rang. It had been about ten minutes since I'd talked to Ryou, and yet when I opened the door, there he was, holding, of all things, flowers and a get well balloon. "How the hell did you get here so quickly?" He blushed furiously.

"Let me in, this is embarrassing enough even bringing something like this, let alone standing outside where everyone can see me with it..."

"As if anyone cares that you brought your boyfriend flowers." He glared at me, face even more red.

"You idiot! I told you, he's not my boyfriend! I've only just met him, and besides- he's too dangerous! That's not even my type!"

"And you don't even protest the idea that you'd have a boyfriend?" I asked, hoping he wouldn't be angry at the implication.

"Well, it's pretty damn obvious." Fair enough...

"Well then, come in. Bakura and I have just eaten breakfast, and Marik is still sleeping." I let him in, but before Bakura could see him, he darted into the kitchen, where he leaned back against a wall. "What's the matter?" I asked, concerned, as he looked sick to his stomach.

"I can't just go in there and give it to him! I'll look like... an idiot!"

"You are an idiot," I pointed out.

"You know what I mean!"

"Not really, I think it's really nice that you thought of him and got him not one, but two things that I know will make his day, since they're from you."

"Oh..." He seemed to be collecting himself, trying to talk himself into it. "You sure it's not stupid?" I nodded. "Alright," he sighed. He took a deep breath, straightened his hair, and walked into the living room- immediately, I heard Bakura's shout of joy.

"Ryou! Whad're you doin' here?" I crept to the doorway and peered into the room to see Bakura, grinning like mad (surprise), and Ryou shifting his weight nervously from one foot to the other.

"U-um, well, I just thought that I could... you know, stop by and see how um, you were doing, and I brought you these!" He said the last part in a rushed breath, mushing the words together as he held the flowers and balloon out to Bakura. The latter seemed stunned.

"You- you got these fer me? Really?" Ryou's face turned beet-red.

"I- er, no, just a joke! How stupid, right?" Okay, this was where I would step in, if he didn't clear this up...

"No, not stupid... I like 'em."

"O-Oh! Really? Then yes, they're for you. I mean, if you want them, you don't have to have them, if you don't want them, I mean, or-" Bakura's muscular arm shot out, hooking around Ryou's waist.

"Shh, don' worry 'bout it. I like 'em," he reiterated, "and I like you." He planted a kiss on Ryou's cheek, which I had thought was as red as it could get (I was wrong). "D'you like me?" I ducked back into the kitchen just as Ryou looked around to see if anyone was within earshot.

"Y-yeah... I do." I barely heard it, he said it so quietly. I did a little victory dance- all the way to the other room. "Oh, that's not gay at all, Malik," He hissed, once he realized that I'd heard him."

"Like you're one to talk!" I sang as I danced my way into Marik's room. He rolled over, squinting at me, when I walked in.

"Wa's all the noise 'bout?" He groaned, in exactly the same state I'd been in not an hour before.

"Ryou's here. He brought Bakura flowers and a get well balloon, and I think they're getting along pretty well out there." Marik's face broke into a smile.

"That's really good, Malik... and you look so happy! You're so beautiful when you smile. Well, all the time, but you know..." he yawned.

"Oh, whatever," I waved away his compliments, blushing like Ryou.

"No, I'm serious!" he insisted. I smiled at him, embarrassed, and he patted the bed next to him. I sat down, and then snuggled against him. He sighed in contentment. "Malik," he whispered. When I turned my attention to him, I found his face closer than I'd expected. His hand brushed my cheek, much like Pegasus had done the day before- except that it was okay, because this was Marik. Marik, who would never do anything to hurt me. Then, he leaned in closer, and even though I was freaking out inside my head, when his lips met mine, I felt at peace. I returned the kiss, much to my own surprise. When we parted, I buried my face in his chest, embarrassed. He kissed the top of my head. "Oh, Malik. What would I do without you?" I wasn't sure how to answer (besides, I think it was hypothetical, more or less), so I didn't, and we just sat there together in blissful silence.

"You know, it's about time for you to get out of bed." He shook his head.

"No way. I'm planning on laying here, all nice and warm and comfy with you for at least another half-hour. Maybe more." I sure wasn't going to argue with that.

* * *

A/N: I am a huge fail, and I'm really sorry. I've been on break from school, so I've been working more. now that school's started, though, I'll have a nice long break in the middle of the day to get a lot of writing done. if you can find it in your heart... please forgive me :)

*many thanks to soundofmadness223 for motivating me*

I love all the reviews I'm getting; thank you all so much for your feedback. I really appreciate it!

I love you all, so don't hate me for taking FOREVER. hopefully, next chapter will be up sooner. :D thanks for reading!


	14. Chapter 14

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Fourteen~

* * *

By the time that Marik and I finally managed to convince ourselves that it was a good idea to get out of bed, it was almost three o' clock.

"So… Ryou's still here?"

"As far as I know, he was when I last checked." Marik draped his arm around my shoulder, and we shuffled into the other room- where Ryou and Bakura were laying on the sofa, watching the news.

"What's goin' on?" Marik asked, yawning and stretching. Both of our white-haired friends shushed him, Ryou gesturing towards the television.

"The perpetrator in these non-fatal attacks has not yet been apprehended, but each of the victims describes a well-built, blond male, possibly with a scar across one side of his face." Gee, I wonder who that could be?

"Victims? Victims my ass!" Bakura shouted angrily, throwing the remote at the wall. It hit the floor, the back panel detaching and clattering along the floor, and the batteries rolling off in different directions.

"Dammit, Bakura! What have I told you about breaking my shit?" Marik shouted back. "Now I'm harboring a fugitive," he muttered, semi-angrily.

"You heard what that bitch said about those fucking-" Ryou silenced Bakura by putting a petite hand over his mouth.

"We know, Bakura. We're all just as pissed off as you are." He was right there… although I was feeling more of a heavy sense of dread than anything. Bakura had already gotten hurt because of me, and now he had the police looking for him, too?

"Malik?…Malik, you okay?" I shook my head, both in response and to clear out my thoughts.

"This is my fault." Marik sighed heavily, rolling his eyes.

"No, actually, it isn't. It's their fault, for being such disgusting human beings, and it's Bakura's fault, for letting them see him." Bakura nodded agreement, to mu surprise.

"Yeah, I know better than that. I was just pissed. That's why this happened, too-" he gestured to his wounds. "So you'd better shut up about how all the world's problems are 'your fault,' you got it?" I smiled, feeling a bit better, but not entirely convinced.

"Still, I shouldn't have said anything. I knew how angry you two would be, if you knew that they were the ones who'd hurt me, and I knew I shouldn't say anything, but I did." Bakura gently moved Ryou off of his lap and climbed off of the couch, walking (a bit unsteadily) towards me.

"I said no more of that!" He told me, catching me in a headlock.

"Ow! Okay! I'm sorry!" I protested weakly, feeling a little panicked at being grabbed- and restrained- so forcefully, but I was surprised to find just how much I trusted Bakura. I mean, I knew him even less than I knew Marik, and I'd seen how dangerous of a person he really was. He had a quick temper and wasn't afraid to resort to violence (I'd say that he kind of liked it, actually), but I still felt safe with him. He'd shown me that he cared about me enough to fight for me (and almost get killed).

"That's better." Bakura released me, and I staggered out of his reach, rubbing my neck.

"Normally," Marik said, glaring at Bakura, "I would beat you up for touching my boyfriend. But for once, I agree with you." I sighed, putting up my hands in defeat.

"Alright, whatever. What are we going to do about this whole situation, though?" I brought up a pretty good point, you have to admit…

"Well… like I said, we know where they live," Marik pointed out. "You didn't object to the death threats I'd mentioned earlier…" He was right…

"Yeah!" Bakura shouted, pumping his fist in the air victoriously. "I've always wanted to cut letters out of magazines and glue them together!"

"We'll have to wear gloves, though, so that they don't find our finger prints. We should also use magazines that don't belong to us, too," Ryou chimed in. "They might be able to tell which magazines we're subscribed to, based on the letters cut out of them, and/or the words on the other sides." It always helped to have a genius in the group.

"I'll go grab some of the neighbors' recycling," Marik told us, slipping on his shoes and walking out the door.

"Alright then, I guess we'll be threatening them… what should we say?" I asked Ryou and Bakura, who were back in their original position on the couch.

"Well, we'll tell them to drop all charges, or I'll finish the job," Bakura began cheerfully, "and then we'll include something about them hurting innocent people, so that even if they do show the cops, they will be less likely to really search for me." Oh yeah, Bakura was good at what he did. "I mean, it's not like I actually killed anyone, and if they think the guys deserved it, they'll just drop the case. If they keep searching for me, then we'll just have to send a note to the police with a few details about why they deserved it... Don't worry, Malik. We won't say anything specific, just vaguely what they're guilty of, and how they deserved much worse than what they got." Okay, so we had two geniuses in the group, just on different topics. "And if _that_ doesn't work, I'll just hit up my contacts at the department." Why wasn't I surprised?

"So why don't you just hit them up first?" Ryou asked, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Because, hun, you don't want to run to your contacts all the time; they'll be less likely to help you out if you're always depending on them. Besides, I already said that I've always wanted to send these kinds of letters. And if we scare the living daylights out of these guys, they're less likely to hurt people, knowing that I'm not afraid to hurt them. We can't let them push us around by turning the police against us, when they're the ones who deserve to be rotting in a cell." It was clear that Bakura took this whole 'reporting and describing him to the police' issue very personally. Not that I disagreed with him, of course.

"Look what I found!" Marik called, throwing open the front door. Ryou rolled his eyes.

"Don't touch them, I'll be right back." He ran out to his car, coming back with his case of supplies- gods bless forensic science students. He handed us all rubber gloves, and Marik dumped the magazines on the floor, and then went to find scissors and glue or tape. He'd hit the jackpot, in the magazine department- there were all kinds of hunting ones, as well some detective/crime ones- full of words such as 'hurt,' 'kill,' and all manner of other violent words- words perfect for threatening people. Ryou began flipping through the crime one.

"This is perfect for the one to send to the police station," he commented, tearing out a page and setting it aside for later use.

"What is it?" I asked, peering over, but he covered it up.

"I'll show you when I'm done." Fine, then, if that was how he was going to be...

"Marik, did you find anything?" I called.

"I got scissors and paper, but no glue... I'll run to the store and grab some glue sticks." He tossed the pile of supplies on the floor, and once again headed out the front door. It was handy being so close to everywhere useful.

"Bakura, what should I say in mine? I'm not too experienced at threatening people..." He looked at the magazines I had.

"Well, just... whatever you want them to know. You're the real victim here, not these bastards. Tell them how you feel and what you want to do to them." Well... this could be interesting. I began searching through the magazines, searching for the right letters and words. 'Stolen' popped out at me, as did 'regret.' They both worked pretty well... it was like I got the perfect magazines to express my... what _was_ I feeling? I had been so busy trying to _not_ think about the events of that night, trying to _avoid_ anything that might remind me of it, that I hadn't been able to come to terms with anything. About ten minutes after he'd left, Marik returned with glue sticks, more scissors, and some construction paper.

"What is this, arts and crafts time?" Bakura joked. Marik stuck his tongue out.

"It was your idea, you retard. Now let's get to work; these letters aren't going to glue themselves." He passed out the glue, and set the paper and scissors in a pile. I grabbed a piece of paper and began gluing, slow and meticulous. I was getting pretty in to it; everyone else had finished twenty minutes before I had.

"You want to hear what we've got?" Ryou offered, holding up his happily. I could tell that he really liked the idea of hurting the people who'd hurt me.

"Sure."

"'Stop the police hunt, or I'll do worse than just hurt you- you deserve everything you get for hurting innocent people.' See? That way, they can't show this to the police, and even if they do, they won't be able to explain the part about hurting people." I smiled at Ryou.

"Thanks, that sounds really good..." Marik and Bakura read theirs- they'd each done two.

"And this one," Bakura held up his second one, "is the one we're going to send to the police station. 'The 5 men who reported the attacks are liars and rapists. You should thank me for kicking their asses.'" He pointed to the word 'rapist.' "See? This is the one that I found. It was in that crime mag over there." He was clearly quite proud of himself. It was quite clever and well-done.

"I like the little batman cutout..." I pointed to the figure glued on the bottom of the page.

"Yeah, that's to give them the idea that I'm a super hero. You know, beating up bad guys and stuff." I nodded.

"It's fitting." Hey, as far as I was concerned, he really _was _a super hero.

I held up my finished work, and was a little embarrassed to show the others. It was pretty personal and revealing.

"You okay, Malik?" Marik was giving me a concerned look, and I realized that my hands (and the paper I was holding) were shaking. "You don't have to do this; we're more than happy to threaten all of these guys for you. And you don't have to read it out loud; we all understand." I shook my head.

"No. I have to do this... I need to get it out."

I took a deep breath.

"'You and I both know what you did- you've stolen something from me that I can never get back, and I'm damaged in ways that I don't even understand. You got off easily compared to the physical and emotional pain that I've endured thanks to you. If you have any conscience, or any sense of self- preservation, you'll drop charges. Otherwise, the whole world will know exactly what you are, and what you've done.'" There were a few seconds of silence, before Ryou shook his head.

"Well, now I feel inadequate."

"Oh, whatever," I protested, my hands still shaking. I couldn't look anyone in the face. It was way too personal! I should have just settled for vague death threats, like the others...

"See?" Bakura asked. "Doesn't that feel better?" I shrugged, but once I realized that no one was staring at me, just nodding in approval of my letter, I did feel a little better. Not that I was okay, by any means, but the thought of what had happened didn't give me a total panic attack. I even allowed myself a smile, as Marik hugged me tightly.

"Let's get these delivered. Bakura, write down the addresses for us."

"Which..." I paused, then shook my head. "Never mind."

"No, what were you going to day?" Ryou demanded.

"Well, I was wondering... which house was the largest man's?" I stared at the floor, fidgeting. "He gets this one..." I held up my letter. He had been the ringleader of the group; he had been the one egging the rest of them on, and he'd hurt me the worst. Without a word, Bakura circled one of the addresses, pushing so hard with the pen that it tore through the paper. At least I wasn't the only one with that much anger and hatred.

"You and I can deliver them when it gets dark," Marik promised. "I don't want anyone to get a glimpse of the car during the daytime, just in case." I nodded, smiling a little more freely. Things were looking up now. Bakura was okay, these guys had sort of gotten what they deserved, and now, hopefully, the police would just drop everything. And Bakura and Ryou were getting along well, judging by the fact that Bakura was going to hang out with Ryou at his house... which should be interesting, introducing Yugi to Bakura.

"I can go home now, too," Bakura informed us. "I hope no one's broken in to my house..." I wondered what bad part of town he lived in.

"Probably not; they all remember what happened last time someone broke in," Marik pointed out. "Don't forget your meds here." He threw the bottles into a plastic bag, handing them to Ryou for safekeeping.

"Call me, Malik, and let me know how it goes," Ryou ordered.

"Yes, sir!" I saluted him jokingly. "Don't worry, I'll call you." They left, and I let myself relax. I hadn't even realized how tense I was, but now that it was just Marik and me, I let out a huge sigh of relief.

"See?" He murmured in my ear, nuzzling against me. "I told you everything would be okay." I smiled back at him.

"I know," I told him. "Thanks to you." He shook his head.

"No, Malik. It's thanks to you. You're healing and making things work for you. We're just helping, and you know we'll be here for you every step of the way."

* * *

A/N: Haha! See? I got this up fairly quickly! I had to reread the whole story, because I wasn't even sure what was going on. I'm going to be better about posting regularly now that I'm at school for hours and hours and hours a day, with nothing to do but write fanfiction.

finally, some plot! I realized that the last three chapters consecutively were pretty much all fluff... :/

let me know what you think! I love you all!

*many thanks to soundofmadness223*


	15. Chapter 15

(I own nothing)

* * *

~Chapter Fifteen~

* * *

**Warning- There's a bit of a lime in this chapter. Not too graphic, nothing too bad. Just letting you know.**

* * *

"You know, technically this is a federal offense, as neither of us are federal officials," Marik informed me as I slipped the final letter into the mailbox. It was around three in the morning, and we had just delivered our cut-and-paste letters.

"Yeah, well, it's also illegal to purposefully obscure your license plate, not to mention threatening people. By this point, I don't even care." He winked at me.

"I didn't care to begin with. Ready to go back?" I nodded decisively, and we headed home, Marik pouting when I insisted that he stick to the speed limit.

* * *

"Thanks for taking me to do that," I told him as I sat on the edge of the bed. "I feel a lot better."

"Good! That's what I like to hear." He smiled brightly at me. "You did a wonderful job."

"All I did was put them in the mailboxes!"

"Yeah, but you did it well."

"Well, thanks then, I guess. Maybe I should pursue a career in mail delivery," I half-joked. It wasn't like I had any better ideas at the moment…

"You're way too smart for that. Not that I have anything against mail workers, but you should do something a bit more… intellectually involved." I always forget how smart Marik is. He acts pretty stupid, sometimes. I nodded.

"I guess… not smart enough to avoid being attacked." I was shocked that I'd said it aloud. Sure, I thought it all the time, but I usually tried to avoid the topic if possible.

"Malik, Malik, Malik." He shook his head, sighing heavily. "How many times have we been over this? It wasn't your fault."

"I could have gone to my sister, if I really needed to, or could have gone to Ryou and Yugi… hell, I could have come here to begin with, before I got all messed up." Yeah, I avoided the topic, but now that I had breached it, I couldn't shut up. "And even if I didn't want to do any of that, I could have gone to a homeless shelter, or somewhere public like that, rather than just walking around deserted areas in the dark, looking helpless." Great, now I was crying again? Why did that always happen? I turned away and wiped my tears quickly, so that Marik wouldn't see, although I'm pretty sure he did. "I'm a retard, and you know it…" He wrapped his arms tightly around me.

"No!" He declared firmly. "You aren't retarded. Sure, there are things you could have done, places you could have gone, but as they say, hindsight's 20/20. You were stressed out and freaking out at the time. No one thinks clearly when they've been under that much strain. And besides, you should be able to trust that you won't get assaulted if you go outside. I just wish I hadn't told Bakura to leave them alive- he wanted to kill them, and if it wasn't for the chance that he could get caught, I would have let him. So listen to me, please, when I tell you that it was not your fault, in any way, shape, or form." I knew he was right, but I still was having a hard time just accepting it. I covered my face with my hands, and a moment later, a warm, comforting arm snaked around my shoulders. I threw my arms around Marik's shoulders, and I felt him stiffen in surprise. "Malik?" I turned my face toward him, kissing his lips as if my life depended on it. He didn't push me away, but he didn't exactly reciprocate. I pulled away to look at him, and he stared back at me, cheeks flushed and confusion evident on his face. He cupped my cheek gently, brushing my tears away. "Malik..." he murmured my name, kissing my forehead. He then kissed each of my swollen, soggy eyelids, my nose, and finally planting a firm (but gentle) kiss on my lips. He smiled at me, pressing his forehead against mine. I clung to the front of his shirt, tugging at it insistently, unable to get close enough to him. And then I slipped my trembling hand underneath his shirt, surprising the both of us. His warmth was unbelievable... I craved more of it, but I feared it at the same time. My breathing sped up, from a combination of excitement and panic, which must have been evident. "Malik, it's okay," Marik whispered, stroking my hair and cradling me close to his body. "Slow down, love... you don't have to do anything."

"I-I want to," I protested uncertainly. "I just..." I wasn't ready. He laid a finger over my lips, following with a soft kiss.

"I know." He ran his hand down my chest to my stomach, making me shake. My breath hitched when he slid his hand up my shirt, ever-so-slowly. He caressed the skin on my stomach, moving on to my bony hips. I was getting a little uncomfortable... As if reading my mind, he reassured me with sweet kisses, trailing them from my mouth, along my cheekbone, to my neck and collarbone, which he seemed to like. He kissed it, and then began sucking on it and nibbling, gently enough that it rendered me helpless without hurting me. I wasn't sure what to do with my hands, but I wanted to touch him. I ran a hand through his golden hair, which was only a bit softer than mine, and explored his toned back muscles with the other. He continued to caress my navel, inching my shirt up until it was around my armpits. His eyes met mine, questioning, as he tugged gently upward on it, asking my permission. I swallowed heavily, clenching my eyes shut, and nodded. He carefully eased it over my head, setting it on the floor next to him. "Oh, Malik," he whispered, the feeling of his breath on my skin making me shiver. "You're beautiful..." My heart leapt at the praise. He ran a hand across my now bare chest, brushing my nipples and making me let out a little squeak. "Sorry, you okay?" I nodded quickly, and he kissed me again, this time drawing it out. I hesitated for a moment, then nibbled tentatively on his bottom lip. He gasped, capturing my mouth in a deep, intense kiss, his arms pressing me closer to his body. I tensed as I felt one hand stray lower, brushing over my jeans, but that was all he did. When I relaxed, he began kissing me again, and started rubbing my abdomen, hips, and thighs lightly. Crap, I was starting to... react. In certain regions. My breathing sped up in panic, but Marik seemed to not notice, as he began touching me _there, _through my pants. I clutched at his chest as he murmured reassurances to me. After all, this was Marik- he _wasn't_ going to hurt me. As long as I kept reminding myself of that fact, I would be fine... maybe. I gasped aloud as he unbuttoned my pants, unzipping them smoothly. "Don't worry, love," he whispered, sliding his hands under my boxers, his warm hands touching my skin everywhere. "You're okay..." I was trying to tell myself the same thing, and he seemed to understand this. He gave me a few minutes to control my breathing, to quell the panic that had risen, and then began stroking me, softly and gently. I couldn't stop myself from letting out little sounds of pleasure. I could feel my cheeks burning, and I hid my face behind my arm. "Are you okay?" He asked, pausing momentarily.

"Embarrassing," I grunted, refusing to look at him.

"It's not embarrassing, it's sexy," he argued, increasing his speed and making me whine pathetically. "See? You're so damn hot..." He kissed me again, holding me close to his body, and then pulled away. I was worried I'd done something wrong... until I realized what he intended.

"No! No, you d-don't have to do anything, seriously," I gushed, my words going unheeded as he pulled my pants down below my hips, exposing me completely. I clenched my eyes shut, again embarrassed, hoping he wasn't looking at me. My eyes flew open again, shocked by the warmth and just... complete, debilitating _pleasure_ caused by Marik's mouth, which was now surrounding me. I felt bad, though, because it was disgusting, and he was so wonderful, and he shouldn't have to do that for someone like me. I didn't deserve it. "S-sorry," I stammered, unable to really say more.

"Mmm-mmm," he objected, not letting me go once, and the vibrations from his voice gave me even more pleasure. Well, if he said so... and it wasn't like I had even suggested it. If he was going to do it anyway, I might as well enjoy it, right? Marik was the one who always said I deserved to be happy and enjoy myself... and with the things Marik was doing with his tongue, it was all I could do to string a few thoughts together. I moaned softly as he wrapped his overly long tongue around me completely, sucking (what felt like) as hard as he could. When he began massaging my testicles with his other hand, I cried out quietly.

"N-n-Marik, I-" I choked as I came, falling backward on the bed, clenching my eyes shut until the waves of ecstasy had passed. "I'm s-sorry, I'm sorry," I panted. He took a drink of the flat soda on the bedside table, then held me close, kissing my cheek. I turned, latching on to him as if for dear life.

"Shh," he murmured. "Don't be sorry. You okay?" I nodded, hesitantly. He smiled. "Good."

"B-but it's so gross; I'm so sorry!" He shook his head forcefully, glaring.

"No, it's not gross! You've nothing to be sorry about! If anything, I should be thanking you for letting me touch you. You're so damn gorgeous, and you're sexy as hell. I love you, Malik. I fucking love you." I opened my mouth, but was totally speechless. Rather than searching for words (that wouldn't adequately express what I was feeling), I just nodded, feeling myself tear up. I didn't have to say anything, but I knew he understood, as he kissed me, sweetly and passionately. Despite our proximity, and the fact that my pants were still around my ankles, I'd never felt safer than I did right then, in his arms.

* * *

A/N: Well, I finally got this chapter done. sorry for the delay; things have been insane lately.

My rat, Phoebe, died, so was in a fanfiction slump for like two weeks... She was quite old, for a feeder rat, at four years, and she had tumors all over. They weren't a problem, until the one popped up in her spine, paralyzing her back legs. :( and she just sort of curled up and went to sleep, so that was good, but... still. I got her cremated (yeah, I'm that awesome), because she was really special to me, and everyone who met her loved her- including people who swore up and down that they hated rats. I have a tattoo of her on my left shoulder blade, because she was the first rat I ever got, and showed me how awesome rats are. she was super personable, and she was everyone's friend. RIP, Phoebe.

sorry for that little ramble; my rats are rather important to me.

also, everything is crazy at work, and it's a long story, but basically my friend got fired and I got suspended for three days because I forgot to ring something up for her... it's all politics, because she did an April fool's joke on the assistant manager's cousin. SO much nepotism; everyone there (myself included :P) got hired because they knew the manager. I dunno, I told them that it was my fault, but they fired her? it's all bullshit. alright, enough ranting.

I figured that Malik would still need to take it slowly, but since it's been like, 11 chapters since his trauma, I figured he could move on, at least a little. :P and Marik is awesome. I apologize for errors, or if I am repetitive with anything. My proof-reading is kind of on back burner at the moment, if that even makes any sense.

I love you all; thanks for reading, and thanks for the reviews, and your concerns about Phoebe. I really appreciate you all, and I'm touched that you care. :)

review, please? it would make my day, and I could use it. :)

~alex~


	16. Chapter 16

(I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh! or anything else I mention)

* * *

~Chapter 16~

* * *

**A/N: I'm really sorry- this chapter will sound really familiar, because I already posted it, apparently, although I don't remember doing it. Somehow, I had it saved on my computer as 2 chapters, though, and they were much better written than the one I had posted. So I just took down my old chapter 16, and I'm posting 16 and 17 as they are on my computer. Honestly, I think it works better this way.

* * *

"Okay, I give up," I declared, throwing my pencil down for the third time in the last hour, again interrupted by my phone. Clearly, it was not the time for schoolwork (despite having midterms this week). I glanced at the ID, and was glad to see that it was Isis, and not Yugi. Not that I don't like Yugi, but I didn't know if I could handle his shrill-voiced excitement right now.

"Hey! How's it going?" I answered cheerfully.

"Malik!" I smiled; I liked to hear my sister happy. "I need to talk to you about the wedding."

"Okay, talk."

"Well, I was wondering if you would..." why did she suddenly sound nervous?

"What is it, Sis?" I asked gently, when she hesitated a moment later.

"Well, would you be willing to give me away?" Huh? Oh, right. The bride's father would normally, but I guess in this case, the closest male relative would have to do.

"Of course! Do you have any idea about dates?" I asked, genuinely excited for my sister.

"Not really, but probably within the next few months."

"So soon?" I was a little shocked.

"Well, I want to get married before I get too pregnant. Not a big deal, but I'd still rather not be huge on my wedding day. Also... would Marik be willing to be an usher?" Again, I was a little surprised.

"Um, I think so- I'll ask him when he gets back."

"Awesome! We need to get together soon... When are you free this week? How about the weekend?" Well this was working out better than I'd expected.

"Sure, I'm free all weekend. Also, I was talking to Yugi, and Yami- his cousin," I clarified, just in case she didn't remember him, although he'd met him once or twice. "has a really good idea for invitations, so if you email me the guest list, we can get a couple made to see what you think."

"Really? Wow, thanks. That would actually be really helpful. We could pay him, a little bit at least..."

"I'll let you work that out with him, but I doubt he'd take very much. He's got plenty of money already."

"I guess so... but still... okay, I'll send you the list. Hey, I have an appointment, and I should get ready. But I'll talk to you later, okay? Give me a call." I promised I would and wished her luck at the doctor's office, turning my phone off once we'd hung up. Now I could get something done…

* * *

Three hours later, I closed my books, a sense of accomplishment settling over me. I turned my phone back on, not surprised when it started freaking out, alerting me to the texts I'd missed. The first was from Ryou.

'Hey, Bakura's coming over; you and Marik are welcome to join us." Well, that sounded like it should be an interesting get-together… the next was from Marik, telling me that he'd be home in a few hours (making him due to arrive within the hour), after he got out of the "damn dentist." And then there were three from Yugi, gushing about how much fun they were having, and how I was missing out, and how Bakura was a bit scary.

'I could have told you that,' I texted back. 'I'll let you know when Marik is back. Maybe we'll head over for a bit." There was one last text, from a number that looked slightly familiar… I tried to remember where I'd seen it.

"Pegasus?" I thought aloud, surprised. "What does he want?" I opened the text a bit apprehensively.

'Hello, Malik. How is Bakura doing? Knowing him, healed already.' Yep. I wondered how many times he'd treated Bakura, that he could predict such a rapid recovery. 'Also, I wanted to make sure that you were still doing okay, in light of your past trauma. People don't recover from that sort of thing easily or quickly.' I was stunned. He texted me to check up on me? There had to be some ulterior motive.

'Bakura is doing very well,' I texted back. 'and thank you for your concern. I'm doing fine. Like I said, Marik helped me, and has been helping me ever since.' I sent it, and received a reply within minutes.

'I have no reason to doubt your insincerity, but I feel that it's my duty as a physician to make sure that you are, in fact, out of harm's way. I understand if you're hesitant to trust me, but know that I wish you no harm, and if you're in any danger, or are being mistreated in any way, I here to help. I am a doctor… I help others when they're unable to help themselves. My methods may be a but unorthodox, but I have your best interests at heart.' Well. That was… wordy. and completely unexpected. Nice, but… a bit suspicious. He hadn't asked anything of me, though, and hadn't asked anything too personal, like where we lived or anything, so… it could be plausible that he was just concerned. For a moment I was stumped, not sure what to say in response, so I decided I would just be honest.

'Pegasus- thank you; I appreciate your concern, but I can assure you that Marik has been more than accommodating. He's taken very good care of me. I've been doing much better, although I still can't handle too much contact.' I blushed as I even typed the words. Damn me and my sensitivity to such things! 'Marik is protective of me, and he is careful not to push me into anything I'm not comfortable with.' That was probably the safest way to say what I was trying to convey. 'Again, thank you so much. I'll be sure to contact you if anything comes up.' I sent it, slightly concerned about what I might get back, but he didn't respond. Fine by me; I had enough to do already. I heard Marik pull in the driveway and jumped up, tiding my work area.

"Hey, how's it going, Malik? He asked, sounding a bit surprised as I hugged him."

"Good… Bakura is at Ryou's and Yugi's, and they want us there." He raised his eyebrows.

"Oh really? That ought to be to head out in a minute?" I smiled at him.

"Only if you do."

"Hell yes, get your shoes on." I decided not to show him the texts from Pegasus for now. Not that I wanted to keep them a secret, but… they were between Pegasus and me. Besides, Marik would just worry about them, and I wanted us to all have fun. I pushed away all thoughts of Pegasus and his texts as I put my shoes on, ready for what was sure to be an adventure.

* * *

A/N: don't hate meeee, I know it's been ages since I updated, and then it's just a revision of a previously posted chapter... but I have the next few chapters written, and now that I'm typing and I've had some coffee, I'll hopefully be able to get you at least one new one within a couple of days.

many thanks to RingLeader of the Dark Circus, and A Neverending Dream of Flight, for your recent reviews and words of encouragement that I apparently needed to get up off my ass and work on my fics.

and as always to soundofmadness223

thanks everyone, for sticking with me.

~alex~


	17. Chapter 17

(I don't own anything)

* * *

~Chapter 17~

* * *

**A/N: Here's the second part of the original chapter 16. again, sorry for the confusion.

* * *

"Malik!" Yugi shrieked- yes, shrieked, like a little girl- throwing himself at me. "I missed you! Oh, hi, Marik. How're you doing? Not that I didn't miss you too, but you know what I mean!" Marik laughed.

"Shit, kid. How much caffeine have you had today?" My friend grinned.

"Enough. I didn't sleep last night; Portal 2 came out, and I had to beat it." I was honestly a little surprised it had taken it that long. Yugi was a whirlwind when it came to any kind of game (of course he was a whirlwind anyway).

"Was it good?" Marik asked, seeming genuinely interested. Yugi nodded, but before he could respond, his nearly identical cousin, Yami, entered the room, rolling his eyes.

"So good, apparently, that it was necessary to play that 'Still Alive' song at top volume at three in the damn morning, while making brownies and downing coffee." I should have known he hadn't been playing it all night; of course, when Yugi gets wound up, there's no sleeping for a while- sometimes two or three days. "Hello, Malik. How're you?" I nodded politely to him. "And I don't think I've met you, but you must be Marik?" Oh!

"Sorry! Yes, this is Marik. Marik, this is Yami, he's Yugi's cousin."

"No family resemblance there," Marik joked as he shook Yami's hand.

"Ryou!" Yugi suddenly shouted, scaring the crap out of me. "Malik and Marik are here!"

"So Bakura is your friend?" I heard Yami ask Marik. Marik nodded.

"Yeah, we've known each other for a long time, since we lived in Egypt." Yami's eyes widened, giving him a Yugi-esque look.

"Egypt? What part?" He asked excitedly. I'd forgotten that Yami's father hailed from Egypt.

"We both lived in Cairo; my parents moved here when I was 16, and Bakura moved here a couple of years later." Yami nodded.

"My father is from the southern part of Egypt, and he still owns his home there." Marik's eyes widened, and he looked slightly excited.

"Very nice! It's a beautiful area..." Yami nodded.

"Yes, and once I finish my schooling, he's giving it to me."

"Well, that's pretty awesome," Marik mused. "Talk about motivation."

"Ooh, I see you've met the pharaoh?" Bakura sneered as he entered the room. Yami stiffened slightly, and Ryou glared at him.

"Huh?" Yeah, I'm a smart one.

"That's a weird nickname, and it doesn't even make sense!" Yugi pouted, and Yami seemed to agree. I sensed a bit of tension between Yami and Bakura; I wondered if they'd known each other before, or if they'd just clashed instantly.

"Not really; he's Egyptian, has a rich family, and is going to have his own estate in Egypt. Makes sense to me... and then there's his major to consider." I looked at Yami.

"What are you going to school for anyway?" He sighed.

"Alright, it sort of makes sense; my major is historical anthropology, with a focus on Egyptian history." Okay, even I had to admit that it was a pretty clever nickname. "And a minor in linguistics, but I'd almost have to. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to read most of the relevant texts."

"What about translations?" Ryou asked; I could tell he was interested in all of this. Yami shook his head, almost scornfully.

"I don't trust most translations. No matter how well you know both languages, and how good of a translator you are, there are still things that just don't quite translate. Certain things have to be read in their native tongue, or you'll miss something- maybe something crucial." Marik nodded.

"That's legit. Especially with such ancient languages, I'm sure there's a lot to be lost in translation." Well, it was good to see that Marik got along with Yami better than Bakura did... although I couldn't really tell what Yami and Bakura thought of each other. They didn't seem overly hostile, but they weren't exactly friendly. Of course, that could have something to do with the fact that Yami lived in the same house as Ryou, and Bakura seemed a bit jealous and protective wherever Ryou was concerned. The doorbell rang, and Yugi sprang from his seat (it was shocking enough that he'd sat down in the first place, as hyped up as he was).

"I'll get it!" Judging by his hopeful demeanor, he was expecting someone. He threw open the door, beaming at the tall, brown-haired man who stood there. "Seto! Hi." A smaller boy, with long, dark, bushy hair darted past Seto and practically attacked Yugi.

"Oh my gosh, Yugi! Did you beat it?" he gushed, seemingly unable to sit still.

"Oh my gosh YES, wasn't it amazing?" They marveled over the awesomeness of Portal 2 for a minute, before the boy even noticed all the company.

"Oh! Hi!" He bowed toward Marik and me, then toward Bakura. "I'm Mokuba. That's my brother, Seto." He pointed toward the tall man who was standing a bit awkwardly by the door, Yami clutching his arm.

"Seto, this is Bakura," Yami told him, "And this is Malik, and Marik. Everyone, this is Seto." Clearly they were an item. Bakura looked a little friendlier.

"Good to meet you all," Seto said stiffly. It was a bit crowed in the small apartment, and he didn't seem comfortable being so close to so many people- I could relate. I cleared my throat.

"You know... it's really nice out. Why don't we go to the park or something? It's a little cramped in here." Mokuba apparently liked the idea.

"YES! And we can get ice cream!" Seto rolled his eyes.

"As if you need more sugar."

"Actually," Ryou spoke up- I'd been waiting for him to say something, like always. "Sugar has the opposite effect on the body, and can even make one sleepy."

"Whatever," Seto muttered, sounding annoyed, but I could see a ghost of a smile. Ryou tidied the small room, before giving it a once-over inspection and deeming it acceptable- for now.

"Okay, let's go." He sighed. I knew the mess was bothering him, but it was also futile to try to clean with Yugi and Mokuba on full-speed mode (or maybe just on speed). "Ok- everyone out," he demanded, his tone leaving little room for argument. Once everyone was out, he locked the door, checking twice to ensure that it was locked.

"OCD, much?" Bakura muttered, earning a halfhearted smack on the arm.

"Oh, shut it," Ryou countered, smiling fondly at him. "At least I'm not a psychopath." Bakura didn't have much to say to that.

As we walked down the sidewalk, Marik put his arm around me, and for once, the public display of affection didn't concern me. We were the least-noticeable pair in the group. Seto was (aside from being very attractive) fairly ordinary-looking, but Yami's hair attracted enough attention for both of them. Bakura just looked intimidating, and the sun reflected brightly off of Ryou's stark white hair, making it appear to almost glow. Throw in the midget-sized people running around, getting louder and louder the more excited they got, and Marik and I seemed downright normal, compared to our companions.

"Hey," I turned to Marik, remembering my sister's request. "I was wondering... well, my sister wondered if you would would be an usher in her wedding. You don't have to, but I told her I'd ask you, and-" He put a hand over my mouth.

"I'd be honored," he told me, smiling. "I'm surprised that she'd want me in her wedding, and surprised that Patrick would agree to it."

"Well, it's not just Patrick's wedding," I snapped, irritated at the very thought of him trying to run the wedding. Marik laughed.

"I know, it's just usually more of a family thing, especially with a small wedding like they're having."

"Well of course," I replied softly, giving his hand a squeeze. "You are part of our family."

"Thanks, but I'm not sure your actual family agrees." He looked troubled.

"Whatever, Isis likes you, and I love you, and that's all that matters. Patrick will come around, and even if Isis didn't approve, it doesn't matter." I shook my head. "I never understood what Isis saw in that jerk Patrick, but if he makes her feel the way you make me feel, then I can't blame her. And I can't hate him... he loves her, and that's all I could ask. It's been just Isis and me for so long... it's weird to say, but you _are_ my family. You make me feel like I'm home, no matter where I am. I'm safe with you; I can be myself. I feel... for once, I feel like I'm part of something." I paused. "I feel like I belong." I was embarrassed to look at Marik after such a sentimental, revealing speech, but when I did, I was shocked. "Marik? I-I'm sorry, what did I say?" He shook his head, wiping away the lone tear that had fallen.

"All the right things." He pulled me closer, planting a kiss on the top of my head. "Thank you, Malik."

"For what?"

"For making _**me **_feel like I belong."

* * *

A/N: ugh. for some reason, when I uploaded this chapter, it changed all of the quotation marks to either g or h. why? anyway, I just spent like 10 minutes changing them, so if I missed any (or messed anything else up in the process), I'm quite sorry.

thanks so much for reading, I'll have the next chapter up soon. :)

~alex~


End file.
